Gangs steal live cables leaving Dublin homes in darkness

Organised criminals have now started using cherry pickers and hoist to access copper, which can fetch them up to €5,000 per tone on the scrap market. Over the past 3 weeks, there have been a total of 12 power cables stolen which Gardai are currently investigating. ESB experts have said that the criminals behind these thefts were putting other people’s lives in danger as well as causing outages, because the wires where just left dangling about a metre off the ground.

A Fianna Fail Local election candidate for Dun Laoghaire, James McCann said, “Not withstanding the obvious dangers to those cutting the live wires, pure idiocy, it poses a serious safety risk to the residents in the area where the exposed wires are left dangling from posts.”

However, Ireland is not the only place where theft of copper occurs; it is an emerging problem across all of Europe. It is believed last October, that the European Parliament stated it has become a worrying problem in Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Germany. It marks a development in the theft of copper piping and wiring, and how it has upgraded from earlier gangs only targeting homes, buildings and phone cables.

As ESB spokes women has said,”Largely within in the Dublin area over the last three weeks we’ve had 12 incidents. Let alone it is a danger to them, if the live wire comes into contact with earth it will result in death or severe injuries. Last month, four homes went up in flames in England after thieves cut wiring, causing a power surge. Gardaí have set up an operation in conjunction with ESB Networks because of their concerns.”

“Interfering with the power network creates a risk for the public as well as causes an inconvenience to customers by interrupting their electricity supply. The public have an important part to play in helping us put a stop to this type of theft by informing us of any suspicious activities,” she added.