M6 Toll Closed by armed police

qqg3 · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:46

Greebo said:
SO let me get this straight

1. Man on bus with e-cigarette
2. E-cigarette in bag
3. As it's in the bag, accidently pressed button which released vapour
4. Passengers see vapour coming from bag
5. Passengers report it to the bus driver or one of them rang the police
6. 200 armed officiers, the whole county's fire brigade and MOD bomb disposal turn out
7. M6 closed for half a day
8. Passengers sit in a compound under armed guard for hours and not allowed to talk to each other.

Are we really that paranoid nowadays that nobody thought it wasn't a good idea to ask the person first as to what the vapour was and just assume it was a chemical weapon?

It almost sounds like a film or tv show where the protagonist never gets the chance to explain themselves fully to the hero female character or whatever and silly consequences occur . Heh...

jaybee · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:47

Greebo said:
SO let me get this straight

1. Man on bus with e-cigarette
2. E-cigarette in bag
3. As it's in the bag, accidently pressed button which released vapour
4. Passengers see vapour coming from bag
5. Passengers report it to the bus driver or one of them rang the police
6. 200 armed officiers, the whole county's fire brigade and MOD bomb disposal turn out
7. M6 closed for half a day
8. Passengers sit in a compound under armed guard for hours and not allowed to talk to each other.

Are we really that paranoid nowadays that nobody thought it wasn't a good idea to ask the person first as to what the vapour was and just assume it was a chemical weapon?

1: "Why excuse me old chap, your bag appears to be on fire?"

OR

2: Ring police and report terrorist threat.

Difficult choice.

mrk · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:48

Johnnytoxic said:
Hopefully this will make the general public aware of how these e-cigs function and what they are.

Not if they're being referred to as "health aids". That's too complex for the general public to understand. These kinds of people write hand written letters to the BBC when Clarkson tells a joke!

jaybee · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:48

smr said:
I know I'm going into conspiracy theory overdrive but what if the whole thing was staged and set up to deter would be terrorists. It coincided with the terrorism arrests earlier. It's happened at a convenient time before the Olympics - it acts as a warning shot to any would be terrorists that this is how the emergency services would react to such a thing.

Just a thought

edit - beaten , but elaborated upon

I did say earlier could it be that this is a drill.
The bus was on route to London supposedly so... dunno.

Craterloads · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:50

Greebo said:
Are we really that paranoid nowadays that nobody thought it wasn't a good idea to ask the person first as to what the vapour was and just assume it was a chemical weapon?

when you put it like that. When your brain washed constantly by the media/government, this is the result. You know the current "terror" level is at "substantial" after all !

Johnnytoxic · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:51

M6 Toll, always in the news for not being used, probably wouldn't cause that much disruption. You couldn't rule out that it wasn't staged, then again this wouldn't do their "intelligence" rep much good.

Craterloads · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:53

jaybee said:
1: "Why excuse me old chap, your bag appears to be on fire?"

OR

2: Ring police and report terrorist threat.

Difficult choice.

How about you help them put it out, make sure they are ok or assume it's a chemical polonium biological attack.

jaybee · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:54

If it was staged it certainly doesn't show a level of competency that terrorists would need to worry about. Get someone to go up North and puff an ecig so all the forces go up there away from London.

antijoke · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:56

Britains dumbest member of public.

Seems like there is smoke without fire.

estebanrey · 5 Jul 2012 at 15:58

What I don't get is e-cigs hardly produce any vapour unless you actually toot on them, so unless he was using it (in which he's just look like he was smoking a strange fag) I don't buy the 'smoke coming from bag' thing.

realBabelfish · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:01

mrk said:
The Daily Mail needs to post the berk in question.

surely its the idiots who crapped themselves and didnt actually ask the bloke what he was doing who are to blame?

AFAIK its not illegal to use e-cigs on buses.

misterPK · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:03

There has to be something more to this that we don't know about. Maybe some intelligence rumours that something big was going to happen today, or someone slightly dodgy was on the bus. If not, then that's one hell of an over reaction!

Pestilence · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:04

realBabelfish said:
surely its the idiots who crapped themselves and didnt actually ask the bloke what he was doing who are to blame?

AFAIK its not illegal to use e-cigs on buses.

He means the berk who reported it rather than just asking the dude what was going on.

Glaucus · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:04

misterPK said:
There has to be something more to this that we don't know about. Maybe some intelligence rumours that something big was going to happen today, or someone slightly dodgy was on the bus. If not, then that's one hell of an over reaction!

Olympics coming up, they arrested a terrorist ring in London this morning.

ElliorR · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:04

So that smoking aid might well have caused a few more people on that bus to have a smoke to calm their nerves after looking down the barrel of a gun. Well done anti smoking brigade, I hope you're happy

Kerplunk · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:10

So what was the "liquired being poured" then?

mrk · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:14

A Chinese whisper?

estebanrey · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:15

Kerplunk said:
So what was the "liquired being poured" then?

E-liquid.

Curio · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:18

Greebo said:
Are we really that paranoid nowadays that nobody thought it wasn't a good idea to ask the person first as to what the vapour was and just assume it was a chemical weapon?

Sad, isn't it? A nation that (until recently) prided itself on making it through The Blitz with a stiff upper-lip, and living through the constant IRA threat with minimal fuss, is now reduced to panicking at the first sign of a little smoke that could have been from anything.

Woden · 5 Jul 2012 at 16:18

I like to see so many people think a terrorist is going to be honest when he is asked what he is up to.