Oxford News
Woman named and charged after RAF planes are damaged
Two Voyager planes suffered £7 million worth of damage during the incident at the RAF base in West Oxfordshire on Friday, June 20, 2025.
In an early morning raid, protesters on two e-scooters broke into the military base and used fire extinguishers to spray the aircraft with red paint and also threw crowbars into the engine rotors, it is alleged.
As a result, the planes were taken out of action and the turbines needed to be replaced at a cost of £2 million each, a court was told last year.
Five people were already charged with the incident, including Amy Gardiner-Gibson, 29, of no fixed abode, Jony Cink, 24, of no fixed abode, Daniel Jeronymides-Norie, 35, of London and Muhammad Umer Khalid, 22, of Stockport.
On Friday, May 15, Thames Valley Police said it charged Lara Downes, of Gipsy Hill, Norwood, London, on Thursday, May 14.
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Downes is charged with criminal damage, contrary to section 1(1) of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 and entering a prohibited place for a purpose prejudicial to the United Kingdom, contrary to section 4(1) of the National Security Act 2023.
The 44-year-old was remanded in custody to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Friday.
A provisional trial date at the Old Bailey was set for six to eight weeks from January 18, 2027.
Two jet engines, one on each Voyager aircraft, had to be replaced following the incident at a cost of £2.5 million per engine, a court heard previously.
Fire extinguishers marked with the words Palestine Action and Palestinian flags were recovered at the scene.
Palestine Action went on to claim responsibility for the incident in a YouTube video which included footage of the incident.
The Government subsequently moved to proscribe the group under anti-terror laws on July 5.
Sir James Eadie KC, for the Home Office, told the court that the ban “strikes a fair balance between interference with the rights of the individuals affected and the interests of the community”.
But in the High Court decision in February, Dame Victoria Sharp, Mr Justice Swift and Mrs Justice Steyn said the ban was “disproportionate”.
Reading a summary of the decision, Dame Victoria said: “The nature and scale of Palestine Action’s activities falling within the definition of terrorism had not yet reached the level, scale and persistence to warrant proscription.”
The ban has remained in place until the conclusion of the Home Office challenge.
The Environment Agency is on a mission to clear 21,000 tonnes of waste that was illegally dumped in one go in Kidlington.
The massive heap of hazardous rubbish, described by an MP as “threatening an environmental disaster”, stretched 150m and was around 20ft (6m) deep in November last year.
Diggers and lorries can now be seen picking up and clearing rubbish from the site next to the A34 and River Cherwell near Kidlington.
However, the sheer scale of the dump, which is nearly 12 metres high in places and contains plastic, foam, tyres and wood, means the substantial operation will take another five months to complete.
The agency, which declared a critical incident into the enormous pile of waste back in November 2025, started the clean up in April this year.
It has said the total operation is expected to cost around £7 million – but the agency is hoping to reclaim this money in court by seizing money from the criminals who illegally dumped the waste.
To date, four men have been arrested as part of the criminal investigation.
The four men include a 52-year-old man from Ashford, Surrey, who was detained in February, a 39-year-old man from Guildford who was held in November, a 69-year-old man arrested at a property in Andover, Hampshire, and a 54-year-old man arrested in Slough, Berkshire, who were arrested in January.
Green party leader Ian Middleton questioned why there has been no charges yet.
He said: “It’s good to see that the clearance of the site is progressing but disappointing that there have still been no prosecutions of those responsible, despite some early arrests.
“As the work is now underway, I think it’s appropriate for some further reflection on the early involvement of the Environment Agency and for us to ask why more direct action wasn’t taken by them at the time.
“To that end I am writing to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs – Emma Reynolds – to ask her to implement a public inquiry at the earliest opportunity.”
The dump was first visited by the Environment Agency in July 2025.
Anna Burns, Environment Agency area director for Thames, said the agency had spent time profiling the waste to ensure it was taken to the correct disposal sites, managing the wildlife, ensuring vehicles could come and go quickly and working with the local community and local authority on traffic management.
Work was also delayed slightly by the heavy rain in February, which made the site waterlogged, but Ms Burns said the team was “back on track now”.
“We have taken time to plan so that we can act quickly, and we hope that over the next few weeks we’ll start to see really rapid removal of the waste, with up to 30 lorry loads a day,” she said.
Professor Emma Thomson, from the University of Glasgow and head of the MRC Centre for Virus Research, spoke following a cluster of cases linked to a cruise ship in the South Atlantic.
She said: “It is very, very unlikely that something like this will turn into something akin to the Covid-19 pandemic.”
Samples are being analysed from passengers who travelled on the MV Hondius, where at least 11 cases and three deaths have been reported.
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Prof Thomson said it would “not be very surprising if we found one or two positive tests in the UK” but emphasised that the risk of wider transmission remains low.
She said cases could be “managed very easily with the existing facilities we have.”
The UK Health Security Agency confirmed it is repatriating 10 Britons connected to the outbreak, believed to be residents of the UK overseas territories of St Helen and Ascension.
They will complete their self-isolation in the UK as a “precautionary measure.”
Prof Thomson explained the outbreak involves the Andes strain of hantavirus, the only type known to spread between humans.
She said: “It is not nearly as transmissible as viruses such as measles. We don’t expect to see lots of cases of this virus, thankfully, but obviously the public health measures are really critical.”
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She added that although the virus can cause severe illness, it historically results in only small, limited outbreaks, as seen previously in Argentina.
There is no vaccine or specific treatment for hantavirus.
Researchers at the MRC Centre are exploring whether existing antiviral drugs could be effective.
Professor Sir Peter Horby, director of the Pandemic Sciences Institute at the University of Oxford, said: “I believe the UKHSA, Foreign Office and NHS are taking all the right and necessary measures to protect the UK citizens involved in this challenging incident and to protect the broader UK population.
“Repatriation and isolation is the right thing to do, morally and scientifically.”
Prof Thomson said the MRC Centre will also investigate potential new therapies for the Andes virus.
She said: “Twenty of the passengers who were on the ship have been kind enough to sign up for research, so we can look into new solutions for this real problem.
“There are many gaps, as you know – there is no vaccine and there is no treatments.”
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