Normally, gold is thought to be the most valuable metal in our cultures, but my travels around Europe and reading the news have convinced me that copper is the most sought-after metal by criminals. So, how’s it going in your country? Can you take a quick peek at your local news just to see what’s going on? Thanks!
12 comments
Every few months, maybe?
It’s not common enough to be a major problem but also not unheard of.
We had a few public cases with stolen roofs and sculptures, but it is way more common al a lower level: wires from construction sites.
Well copper theft is always associated with certain minority.
They often steal copper wires and than complain about not having electricity in the settlements.
2021 – Someone stole Jokela’s church bells during the weekend.
2021 – Police wishes hints of copper thievery in Lappeenranta.
2021 – Three men from Romania got conditional imprisonment for copper theft.
2020 – Foreign copper thiefs torment construction sites.
2020 – Police investigates copper thievery in Jämsä.
Etc. There seems to be some every year.
It is regularly in the news, for thefts of copper on … train lines ! Some gangs steal copper cables and it has become a true problem for the national railway company, as it generates a lot of hassle and delays in train travels. Someone in my family regularly commutes on a line that is often targeted, this makes him truly mad because it happens so often.
Yes, copper thefts are quite common here in Scania, especially from railroad tracks, which then of course leads to that all or parts of the train line has to be temporarily shut down. The train line between the city where I live and the village where my parents live has been very badly affected by this. I guess the combination of it going through a rather rural area with a lack of surveillance and only one train in each direction per hour and no trains during the night makes it particularly attractive for thefts by organized criminal gangs. But there are other lines with frequent thefts as well. These copper thefts from the railroads are quite often in the local media and have even been discussed as a serious problem by the Swedish parliament.
It’s fairly regular in the UK – people steal the copper cabling from railways, which causes the signalling system to fail.
Work in a transformer company. Copper is wound into coils here so we’re always having lots of bare copper around. A lot of it. The danger of theft and even robbery is real. Theyve come at night with a front end loader and bashed through a wall before.
We made the mistake once of leaving a returned 20 year old transformer outside at night once, it didnt look appealing but they used a skip loader and dragged it through our car park fencing and away. Police followed the oil trail and found it side up in a field stripped of its copper with the dirty old oil just spilled everywhere. The perpetrators caravans werent even 50m away. Shameless.
The worst case was about 10 years ago where they showed up in a van, jumped out and beat up the goods in guy and stole the reels off the pallets (the few they could lift anyway).
Its not common. But its always something to be aware of. And yes, in each case it was a certain type.
You used to hear about it quite a bit, especially because it’s often train signal lines that are stolen. In 2011 an ICE hit a freight train and partially derailed because 300 meters of cable was stolen (luckily nobody got injured). Also a lot of statues and other art works have been damaged and stolen by copper thieves.
It’s therefor kind of surprising that I don’t remember hearing about it recently, seems that the number of incidents (around train tracks at least) have decreased almost each year, from 516 in 2011 to 65 in 2019.
I’ve never heard of copper theft. To be honest, I haven’t heard of theft in my life. Why would anyone who’s not rich give a shit when some criminals rob a store or a rich mansion? Unless it’s a large scale robbery with shooting and stuff. But I’ve also not heard of those in Germany.
I wonder though how copper theft can be that profitable. You can buy decent amounts in electronic stores for affordable prices. For it to be actually worth a few thousand or however much you’re willing to take a risk for it, you’d have to make a haul quite a bit bigger than with gold. But what do I know.
It’s supposed to happen frequently, I’ve just checked the news for Spain and at least once a month the police arrests people in operatives where they find tons of copper.. it’s like they’re getting cought but they keep trying.
Edit: As any others said, in Spain is also associated with certain minority
I’ve never seen it in the news, but it’s common enough that any optical fiber coils left hanging (to continue installing it the next day etc) have signs saying “it’s not copper”.