Arsonists Attack 5G Mast In Derbyshire

Police have said they believe a 5G mobile phone mast was deliberately set on fire in Derby.

The mast was attacked over the weekend, only days after it was put up earlier in the week, police said.

Derbyshire fire services were called to the site off Old Mansfield Road, in Chaddesden, Derby, just before 2 a.m. on Sunday, to extinguish the blaze.

The street had been closed for several hours between 19 and 21 May while a large construction crane was used to erect the mast, according to local media reports.

Arson

“We believe the fire was started deliberately and we are investigating,” Derbyshire Police said in a statement.

The incident follows a rash of attacks on phone masts over Easter weekend, with at least 20 fires reported.

Another 20 or more mast fires had been reported the previous week, many clustered in Liverpool and the West Midlands, but also as far apart as Huddersfield and Dagenham, Essex.

The fires destroyed equipment used by hospitals and emergency services, while some of the masts damaged supported only non-5G mobile equipment or even fixed phone lines, BT chief executive Philip Jansen said in an article in the Mail on Sunday at the time.

Attackers have reportedly attached barbed wire to telephone poles or placed razor blades behind anti-5G posters.

The fires are thought to be motivated by fears that 5G mobile technology presents a danger to public health and may have helped the coronavirus to spread, theories condemned by experts.