Stuck On The M 20!

[Happy]

  We have just crossed over the M20 at Folkestone.  The road is totally clear and all the trucks have gone for as far as the eye can see - progress, maybe?  I do hope so for the sake of the drivers.

[Chelsea14Ian]

What about Dover,where perhaps  most of the lorries are.

[grendel]

The problem is that the press once again delight in reporting the ten mile tailbacks on the M20, but totally fail to report the changes to that situation, for example yesterday the M20 was shut between about J10 and J12, the previous day there had been huge delays on the M20, but 7 hours later, they had cleared the motorway and moved all the lorries to Manston, today there are road closures around the port and  the approaches, and up near manston. The situation is currently fluid, changing by the hour as the traffic is managed by the police, but thats not what the press want to report, they want to show chaos and queues, as far as Brexit is concerned, this has nothing to do with Brexit, its the normal traffic chaos when the ports are closed, it happens when there are storms, or industrial action too. to be honest the preparations for Brexit probably mean it has been better managed than previous port closures.

yesterday local sources were reporting that the local Sikh community had banded together to provide 800 meals for the truckers in association with kent police.

There have been news reports of some truckers cruising around dover honking their horns, understandably they are upset, they may still have several days transit to get home, so the action by the french government was particularly badly timed this close to Christmas.

there is a second large truck stop in Ashford under construction, unfortunately the facilities are not quite completed. 

I did notice a lot of foreign lorries parked up in laybys and on the hard shoulders of slip roads on the A2, apparently they are unwilling to use the official facilities as there is a cost incurred.

[grendel]

14 minutes ago, Chelsea14Ian said:

What about Dover,where perhaps  most of the lorries are.

most of them will be parked up at Manston, from where they will be staged to Dover in manageable groups.

[grendel]

in other good news there was a covid testing site at Manston, which should make testing there easier.

[Chelsea14Ian]

Yes but will take a long time testing the thousands that are there.

[ExSurveyor]

It was set up this morning using the quick test followed by the laboratory test for any positive results. A large hotel is booked for anyone testing positive, not sure what else can be done in less than 12 hours. No doubt some will say, Too little, too late. 

[marshman]

Ian - I believe France will accept the quick lateral flow test whilst the Dutch are insisting on the lab test! As Grendel says this happens everytime the French go on strike - and thats pretty frequently!!

No boats moving yet but Eurotunnel freight seems to be on the move.(or according to them it is!!! )

[Chelsea14Ian]

I may be wrong  but,I thought  Holland have  the same  strain as us.For sure soon many countries will get this strain as well.

[OldBerkshireBoy]

19 minutes ago, Chelsea14Ian said:

I may be wrong  but,I thought  Holland have  the same  strain as us.For sure soon many countries will get this strain as well.

That may well be Ian but nobody wants more of it.

[marshman]

We didn't want it either but who can say definitely "ours" started here but once its around, no closing of the borders can possibly be effective! Everyone accuses Boris of doing that too late at the outset but everyone else has also closed their borders too late as well, -  once its in the system, nothing can really stop it! If you halt it for a few days you may be lucky but it will spread, like it or not, preventative measures or not!!

[Paul]

I'm afraid this is 100% about Brexit and 0% Covid. The UK is not the first country to announce a COVID mutant strain, in fact the first I believe was Spain, were borders closed then? No they were not. 

[grendel]

Paul, attributing it to brexit would put it in the political realm, banned under the TOS, whereas the stated reason by the French government for closing the border was due to the high levels of Covid occurring in this country.

so unless you wish to refrain from discussing this we will stick with the known facts and statements from the French authorities, rather than attributing it to a political cause.

[SteveO]

It seems to me that this "mutant" strain was talked up by the scientists in order to force the government to introduce further unpopular controls at Christmas.  Whatever France's motives in introducing the travel ban, we have handed the justification to them on a plate.

We see case numbers going up in the UK but we have also stepped up testing massively and are now doing more tests per million of population than anywhere else in Europe.  The old adage goes that if you go looking for more idiots, you will find them. 

 

[grendel]

france has tested nearly 50% of its population, the UK, 75% yet france is ahead of the UK in the number of cases, we are currently testing 758,000 per million population, currently as a country we have performed more tests than any other aside from russia (who have tested approximately 60% of their population, other small countries have higher per capita testing rates, but a lot smaller populations.

the big problem is that people are still travelling the world, and as long as that continues, so will the spread of the virus, no matter how carefully we test. 

[finny]

i wonder how many of the tests show a false positive ??

finny

[ScrumpyCheddar]

 

All the years I done European trucking...

 France was always the country I had most problems with...Was always glad just to transit through and get out..

I’m glad to see many uk hauliers using other routes out the uk via Ireland and other uk ports... 

 

[SteveO]

3 hours ago, ScrumpyCheddar said:

 

All the years I done European trucking...

 France was always the country I had most problems with...Was always glad just to transit through and get out..

I’m glad to see many uk hauliers using other routes out the uk via Ireland and other uk ports... 

I used to be a microbiologist, working to assure the sterility of medical products. Prior to the CE marking of medical devices, the French would take 20 samples of every batch of products we sent them and test them for sterility, using very doubtful methods which often resulted in false failures. If the batch size was less than 20 , the beggars would test the lot.  Interestingly, they didn't test the stuff they made themselves.  Every other country in the world would accept the manufacturer's certification of sterility, which was effectively a guarantee.  You can't beat the French for bloody-mindedness. 

[BroadAmbition]

All the years I done European trucking...

France was always the country I had most problems with...Was always glad just to transit through and get out..
 

Snap

During my time in the RN and all those many countries I visited, the country I always seem to have some problem with whether on duty or not was France.  France is truly a stunning lovely country - Sadly wasted on the french!  (Sorry Vaughan not directed at you or your friends of course), just telling it the way it used to happen to me

Griff

[keifsmate]

4 hours ago, finny said:

i wonder how many of the tests show a false positive ??

finny

Me for one. Someone in our block of flats tested positive so I had a test too. 16 days  later I feel no worse nor better than I did a month ago.

[ExSurveyor]

2 minutes ago, keifsmate said:

Me for one. Someone in our block of flats tested positive so I had a test too. 16 days  later I feel no worse nor better than I did a month ago.

You could be asymptomatic, not affected but still spreading.

[grendel]

I am still spreading, but only at the waistline

[BroadAmbition]

Seen on t news this morning, there are now over four thousand lorries waiting to cross over the channel, they stated the sad fact that some of those drivers will be stuck in their cabs for Christmas day,  Not good

Griff

[Chelsea14Ian]

Griff I heard  six thousand. The fact that thousands, four or six no matter.Very sad that many won't get home in time.

[MauriceMynah]

More and more I find myself looking forward to January 2^nd.  Then we can concentrate on doing the right thing rather than banging on about missed parties.