OK, this isn't funny any more. Where's the army?

[Orangejuicemarathoner]

One quarter of staff and students late to school this morning, and 10% didn't get there at all. It has been announced that, excepting physical disability, any student within 4 miles or adult within 6 miles will be expected to walk in, but Its expected to be worse tomorrow with a good chance we will be closed by Wednesday.

AA reporting over 100 "incidents" on the road within a 10 mile radius of the school - mostly roads blocked, and mostly by queues outside petrol stations.

I struggled to get home by bike, because of the chaos on the roads - I got off my bike and walked several miles of it.

I called in at a supermarket on the way home. The shelves were more than three quarters empty. No bread or milk. So I'm sitting here drinking black tea planning rice for dinner instead of cheese on toast.

I know its not a catastrophe that I spent an extra hour getting home, and dont have milk in my tea, but what is that saying about the state we are in?

AIBU to say the army should be called in. What have we got an army for? Surely, an organisation of thousands of fit, capable, organised individuals, with vehicles and capacity and skills in logistics is exactly what we need to be utilised in this situation right here right now.

PS, is it ok to feed dog food to cats? does anyone know?

Buses were cancelled for several hours today and yesterday in our city. Nor because they had no fuel but because of the gridlock on the roads caused by people queuing on roads trying to get into petrol stations that HAD NO FUEL. The bus company prioritised school transport routes and set off earlier, aborting other routes.

@threatmatrix

How ridiculous. Went to Costco quest behind one car and hit petrol. Passed several petrol stations no queue. Scaremongering at its best.

Dh passed 4 on his way home…all had queues

They can't get the army in to do this in Scotland as they are already helping with ambulances aren't they? Everything is breaking.

I’m fairly certain the medics who are helping out with the ambulances are different from the squaddies with HGV licences who are being called to drive tankers. We have 10,000 soldiers, I’d think that’s enough to cover both.

There is no point looking back, people voted in the dark. The vote might be different if people knew the truth, but they didn’t. Blaming others is a waste of time.

The thing to focus on is where to go from here.

South western UK seems OK. We got petrol as normal when our tank was running low yesterday.

I think your post shows how there is variation in availability of fuel even within regions. I'm in the South West too and all garages within an 8 mile radius were closed and out of fuel over the weekend. I assume some have had deliveries since but I haven't needed fuel so haven't checked.

I've been to 6 stations today - all closed.

I'm on less than 1/4 tank and am supposed to be taking DS to University this weekend (500 mile round trip).

Timing could not be worse.

I appreciate the immediate issue is panic buying but nevertheless the underlying cause is a shortage of drivers exacerbated by Brexit.

It's all very well some people saying it's fine where I am but in some areas of the country it's getting pretty desperate.

I'm not sure what the hell we are going to do if we can't get petrol. It's not like we can go on the train with a terms worth of Uni stuff.

Crikey. This is a bit eye opening. Other than a short queue at the petrol station (perhaps 10 mins at most) and some over excited speculation on the local Facebook group we genuinely haven’t noticed anything much here (SW, market town, not a popular tourist area or anything). Shops seem stocked, and petrol is available. Quite shocked at the variation across the country.

See the Brexiteers are out in force, justifying our race to the bottom.
Did you really vote for this, is this really what you want? Food shortages, fuel shortages...
Disgraceful.

@BreadInCaptivity that’s a pain for you, but he can go on the train with minimal stuff and you can follow on driving up once you have fuel. He doesn’t need a term’s worth of stuff on day one.

@BreadInCaptivity

I've been to 6 stations today - all closed.

I'm on less than 1/4 tank and am supposed to be taking DS to University this weekend (500 mile round trip).

Timing could not be worse.

I appreciate the immediate issue is panic buying but nevertheless the underlying cause is a shortage of drivers exacerbated by Brexit.

It's all very well some people saying it's fine where I am but in some areas of the country it's getting pretty desperate.

I'm not sure what the hell we are going to do if we can't get petrol. It's not like we can go on the train with a terms worth of Uni stuff.

I had a friend who did this yesterday with her DD. Managed to scrounge up enough fuel for the journey there and coasted to a halt outside halls having been in the red for 30 mins. Her DD Is all moved in but she's in a Premier Inn 5 minutes away desperately joining local Facebook groups in the hope they'll have info on where locally has petrol. She has enough to get her to one station (hopefully) so she can't drive round looking.
She hasn't told her DD as she doesn't want to worry her and no one wants their mum 5 mins down the road in their first few days at Uni!

South-east London commuter belt. Pumps in the borough pretty much dry. Not one of the 7 petrol stations in a four-mile radius has fuel, they are all closed. I don't need petrol today, but will be the weekend; highly debatable if I'll actually manage to get any. At least the traffic situation has improved now no stations have fuel -- nobody is queueing to get onto the forecourt, so buses, ambulances etc are safely on the move.

[quote Cocomarine]@BreadInCaptivity that’s a pain for you, but he can go on the train with minimal stuff and you can follow on driving up once you have fuel. He doesn’t need a term’s worth of stuff on day one.[/quote]

Minimal stuff....right.

Like how minimal?

Aside from clothes he needs bedding (pillows, duvets, sheets).

Then add things like his laptop, towels.

He can't just turn up with a weeks worth of clothes.

Aside from that my DH and I would actually like to take him when he leaves home for the first bloody time, rather than stick him on a train.

I have had two roofers here today. Neither had petrol to get here and no local petrol stations open. Their boss had to give them a lift here and picked them up at the end of the day.

@BreadInCaptivity for the price of a tank of petrol you could get Amazon to deliver a duvet, pillows, linens and towels.

Oh, and I went to my local Sainsbury at 7am yesterday and got filled up within 10 minutes. The Early Bird.

Tonight at 7.30pm the two petrol stations on my way home had monstrous queues but they did have petrol.

[quote RosesAndHellebores]@BreadInCaptivity for the price of a tank of petrol you could get Amazon to deliver a duvet, pillows, linens and towels.[/quote]
Are you being deliberately obtuse? Obviously this could be done but aside from the fact that it's an additional expense, wasteful if they already have the stuff, and they would like to see their child off to university, THIS SHOULDN'T BE HAPPENING. Hauliers have been warning of this for months. The government have done nothing to calm jitters and frankly I'm getting sick of all the posts suggesting we evoke some pseudo blitz spirit and walk miles to work/ send children off alone/ manage without food we want just because brexit has buggered up the supply chain and our government is incompetent.

Oh, and I went to my local Sainsbury at 7am yesterday and got filled up within 10 minutes. The Early Bird.

Dh did this this morning…still big queues

gogohm I’m southwest and no Diesel for love or money near us, but hoping it may arrive soon . ..

The media are responsible for creating this situation but I do think they are exaggerating too, people are overreacting too!

I agree boof

We dropped ds2 off on Friday , he’d never be able to manage all his stuff that id been collecting for months on the train by himself

Plus we’d still have to get to the train station and get to his halls at the other end

Don’t feed dog food to cats. There’s not enough specific nutrition in it for them. Dogs can be vegetarian but cats can’t. They eventually go blind and then die.

Oh, and I went to my local Sainsbury at 7am yesterday and got filled up within 10 minutes. The Early Bird.

My husband did the same at Tesco at 7.30 Sunday morning, it was really busy. My car was running on empty so he couldn’t just leave, he queued for 20 minutes. So many early birds.

@Pliudev people who live in military families clearly have a much great insight into military operations. The army have said they can spare 150 drivers, that will make almost no difference when there are about 10,000 petrol stations.

You clearly can’t see the bigger picture, many of the few hundred qualified drivers will be deployed. Then there are army drivers are required for military operations in this country moving things to support troops across the world. This perception that soldiers are sitting around waiting for something to happen is absolutely infuriating, if that were the case my husband would have been home for more than one month this year.

Not a drop of fuel at all in Bedford

@WearsideBridge

See the Brexiteers are out in force, justifying our race to the bottom. Did you really vote for this, is this really what you want? Food shortages, fuel shortages... Disgraceful.

and, so what? its better for the environment and by the look of most people in this country a bit of exercise will do them the world of good