Fears over 'waterfall of oil' dumped near river

An "absolutely horrendous level of oil and litter" has been dumped at a layby, cascaded into woodland and is threatening to pollute a river.

Richard Johnstone said tyres and oil have been discarded on the A14 next to his land, north of Woodford in Northamptonshire.

"It's just mindless. They don't see the consequences of what goes on afterwards – all the clear up and the possibility of loss of life to any animals," he said.

The Environment Agency (EA) visited the site on Sunday and said it had installed absorbent material "to prevent the oil from spreading".

"We believe oil has been tipped down a highways drain on the A14, and we have alerted Highways England," an EA spokesperson said.

"We take our responsibility to protect the environment very seriously and will be back on site tomorrow [Monday]."

Nick Urquhart, who runs a local litter-picking group and is a member of the Nene Anglers, has also visited the site.

"It looks like a war zone," he said.

"There's an absolutely horrendous level of oil - we are probably talking hundreds of gallons.

"There's extensive oil in the ditch and this water course runs into a tributary of the Nene.

"It's a major environmental incident".

Urquhart said the oil appeared to be sump oil from a garage "that has done lots of oil changes".

"It's like a waterfall of oil running down the hillside," he added.

He believed whoever was responsible had been coming regularly for the past few weeks, with the latest waste dumped on Thursday evening.

Johnstone told the BBC the oil was now only about one or two feet deep because it had already soaked away.

"It's gone straight down the end of the culvert into the ditch line... flowing into the main stream," he said.

"It's not just the life in the water - I'm worried about the land animals that drink the water as well.

"And God forbid any pets that get ill because they've been near the contaminated oil."

Johnstone posted about the incident in a local community Facebook group on Saturday.

He urged people to report this to the authorities, and said he had already notified the police, council and Environment Agency.

"I am doing everything I can to get this cleared up so we can have the countryside back to how it should be," he said.

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