Just Stop Oil activists ‘spray orange paint over jets at Stansted airport’

Just Stop Oil activists have sprayed orange paint over private jets at Stansted airport on the airfield where Taylor Swift’s plane is stationed, the environmental group has said.

Two activists entered the private airfield at Stansted airport at around 5am on Thursday and painted two private jets using fire extinguishers filled with orange paint, members said.

A statement from the group named the pair as Jennifer Kowalski, 28, a former sustainability manager from Dumbarton, West Dunbartonshire, and Cole Macdonald, 22, from Brighton.

In a post on X, Just Stop Oil said: “Jennifer and Cole cut the fence into the private airfield at Stansted where @taylorswift13’s jet is parked, demanding an emergency treaty to end fossil fuels by 2030.”

Paint

Two women, aged 22 and 28, have been arrested on suspicion of criminal damage and interference with the use of national infrastructure, Essex Police said.

The accompanying video show one of the activists cutting a hole in the airfield’s metal fence using an angle grinder.

One activist, wearing a Just Stop Oil t-shirt, can then be seen spraying the fuselage and windows of two parked white planes with orange paint, before both then sit together in front of the planes on the tarmac.

Macdonald said: “We’re living in two worlds: one where billionaires live in luxury, able to fly in private jets away from the other, where unliveable conditions are being imposed on countless millions.

“Meanwhile, this system that is allowing extreme wealth to be accrued by a few, to the detriment of everyone else, is destroying the conditions necessary to support human life in a rapidly accelerating never-ending ‘cruel summer’.

“Billionaires are not untouchable, climate breakdown will affect every single one of us.”

Protest

Kowalski said: “Over the years, I’ve had to realise that even working in sustainability provides me with essentially no ability to make the necessary changes to prevent the complete collapse of our natural systems. I have to take desperate measures to make my voice heard.

“In 2024 we all have to be considering what we can do each day to change the course our society is on. We need an emergency treaty to stop the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal by 2030.”

The group’s latest protest comes after two Just Stop Oil activists sprayed orange paint on the prehistoric Stonehenge monument on Tuesday.