Cinder-ash thieves sabotage Spoornet safety

Leonard Neill SPOORNET’S BATTLE against crime has taken on a new dimension with the increasing wholesale theft of cinder-ash fill-up along railway lines, especially along embankments. An eight-ton load of stolen cinder-ash fetches R1800 from brick manufacturers in local communities, says Spoornet’s national chief crime inspection officer Johan Roelofse. The same buyers, he says, are the people who have bought up the bulk of large tarpaulins that are stolen from trains. These are required to cover brick stocks. Apart from being illegal, Ôash-mining’ is also extremely hazardous, he says. The excavation of the material weakens the lines with the result that traffic moving along affected sections often meets with accidents. “Frankly, this represents blatant sabotage, and is as serious as theft of infrastructure along the lines and from rolling stock.” The theft of cabling, signalling equipment and infrastructure, as well as parts from rolling stock and locomotives has resulted in many deaths every year. Spoornet’s losses due to crime and what he terms sabotage runs into millions of rands annually. The company spends R250 million every year on security, of which R230 million goes to contract security. Nevertheless, his unit has had a caseload of more than 9000 incidents to deal with during the current financial year that ends in April. “It’s an enormous task, but we have a dedicated team. The fact that our prosecution success rate runs to 24% is proof of it.”