Watch: Drone footage reveals true picture of search for fuel in Luton

Queues have been creating chaos in the area
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Drone footage showing queuing motorists outside Asda's Wigmore Lane store in Luton has gone viral.

And Lester Jay, who took the video outside the store at around 7.30am on Saturday, said he thought the situation "was just crazy".

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"It was unbelievable and a bit ridiculous," he said. "People think there is a shortage of fuel when in fact it's a shortage of drivers. It's quite annoying."

Queuing traffic outside Asda's Wigmore Lane petrol station at 7.30am on Saturday, September 25Queuing traffic outside Asda's Wigmore Lane petrol station at 7.30am on Saturday, September 25
Queuing traffic outside Asda's Wigmore Lane petrol station at 7.30am on Saturday, September 25

Lester's footage showed the staggering number of cars queuing outside the petrol station as motorists joined the nationwide panic buying for fuel. Several petrol stations in the area have had to shut temporarily while they waited for fresh deliveries after the pumps had run dry.

"I was quite shocked by the video," he said. "From a bird's eye view you can see how far the queues actually go."

Lester himself has been caught up in the queuing. On Monday he joined a queue at the station at 4.30am to get fuel to go to work. "It was the same again this morning," he said. "At 5.30am it sounded like a motorway outside my house."

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Lester has always had a passion for videos and recording, and spent six months training to gain his professional drone licence.

"The results have been brilliant," he said. "You couldn't capture the scale of the queuing any other way."

His video has attracted comments from people caught up in the chaos. One said: "I’m so fed up of this. There’s absolutely no thought whatsoever for the people who live on the surrounding streets and have to use this road to exit their roads by car. I live off Eaton Green Road and got stuck there for 15 minutes yesterday just trying to get past the Shell garage. It honestly makes me despair for humanity when I see people acting with such a lack of intelligence or consideration".

And another said: "Medics/ maintenance/ suppliers/ emergency services/ transporters/ care sectors/ engineers of most sectors require the diesel/ fuel/ petrol to do their jobs for us just so we people get what we need to see each day through during this pandemic of pandemics."

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Bedfordshire Police say they have received a number of calls relating to traffic in certain areas of the county due to queues at petrol stations.

A spokesman said: "Traffic jams do not need to be reported to us unless they risk causing harm to pedestrians or other road users.

"Please only buy petrol if you need it. If you are queuing to buy petrol, we would ask that you make sure that you are not blocking roads while queuing, it’s important that emergency vehicles are able to pass at all times".

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