Crooks drain £500 of diesel from truck

Sep 23 2011 by Denis Brown, Perthshire Advertiser Friday

VEHICLE owners in Perthshire were issued a red alert yesterday after sneak thieves drained a giant HGV’s fuel tank.

An entire payload of diesel – a staggering 440 litres worth £500 – was syphoned from a 44-tonne DAF lorry parked overnight on Invergowrie’s Main Street in the incident.

A Tayside Police spokesman said the Carnoustie company’s driver had parked the artic at 8.30pm last Monday and did not discover the fuel theft until turning the ignition key at 7.30am next morning.

“So far we haven’t managed to find any witnesses who saw anything, so we’d like to appeal to anyone who did to contact us,” he said.

Earlier this month, light-footed crooks drained the fuel tank of a Scania truck parked in an A9 layby one mile out of Perth on the southbound carriageway – while the driver was sleeping in the cab.

The Banffshire driver was tucked up in his bed at 12.20am on Friday, September 2 when he heard strange noises outside.

Stepping outside to investigate, he saw two vehicles making an apparent getaway before discovering the cap on his fuel tank had been removed and was dangling on a chain above a fresh puddle of diesel.

After checking his fuel gauge he estimated about 40 litres – or £52 – had been syphoned from the tank.

Bizarre

Although it was dark, the driver managed to jot down a partial number plate of what he thought looked like a silver people mover – the plate ended in ETY.

He later told police the second vehicle appeared to have been a dark-coloured saloon.

The police spokesman said the incident was one of the more bizarre capers reported recently, adding that it demonstrated the lengths desperate crooks were prepared to go to in pursuit of free fuel.

“It’s definitely one of the more sneakier thefts we’ve heard about recently and with fuel becoming more expensive, we’re seeing more spates of this type of crime,” he said.

Meanwhile, police have issued an alert to farmers, urging them not to leave tractors, combine harvesters or any other vehicles unattended in fields overnight.

The cautionary advice follows the theft of a substantial quantity of diesel from a combine harvester which had been parked overnight in a field, a practice that during the current harvest season is not uncommon.