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"Be vigilant, there's an idiot kicking about again": Cyclists warned as latest wire trap "clearly intended to do harm" found on trail

A dog walker found and removed the "wire-filled electric fencing mesh" tied tight at head height, before raising the alarm with a local cycling group...

Cyclists in Sheffield were warned to "be vigilant" after a dog walker reported finding "a length of wire-filled electric fencing mesh" strung tight and at head height near a popular beauty spot, the homemade trap "clearly intended to do harm".

A photo of the trap was shared in the Ride Sheffield Facebook group by John Butterworth, the man who found and removed the trap. He found it while on a dog walk on the morning of Friday 8 November at Wharncliffe Woods between Wharncliffe and Grenoside, a popular wooded area several miles to the north of Sheffield.

Dog walker finds latest wire trap targeting cyclists (John Butterworth/Ride Sheffield on Facebook)

The wire "tied tight and well" at head height and "clearly intended to do harm" is the latest grim instance of homemade traps being strung across or placed on routes popular with mountain bikers. Numerous sickening traps have been spotted across the UK in recent years, with one particularly disturbing case from South Wales in 2021 seeing a cyclist left needing 17 stitches for a wound to his neck caused by a barbed wire trap.

Now, raising the alarm about the trap found in South Yorkshire, Mr Butterworth warned riders who use the area to "be vigilant as there's an idiot kicking about again".

"Please be aware," he said. "Been out with the dogs this morning, along the path that runs beside the wall between the woods and the chase, someone has tied a length of wire-filled electric fencing mesh at riders' head height.

"It's been removed and taken away. But it was tied tight and well and clearly intended to do harm."

> Cyclist injured by homemade nail trap, warns local riders of hidden danger on popular trail after suffering puncture wound

A local councillor for the Grenoside ward told The Star the trap is a "really dangerous act" and the person responsible "needs to think again about what they are trying to do".

"If someone has concerns about where cyclists are riding, they should come to us, the local councillors and members, if they're not happy," Mike Levery said. "What has been done here is dangerous, and if you're on your bike going at speed, you're not going to be able to stop in time."

South Yorkshire Police told the local paper that the force has not received a report regarding the trap. We've contacted the force to confirm if that is still the case, but had not heard back at the time of publication.

One rider commenting on the situation asked if it had been reported to the police as "our local councillors organised a community police meet and greet recently" where "wires across cycle routes was raised and the police said they want to know when this happens" as "if nothing else, this gives them an idea of how often and where it happens".

Another thanked the dog walker for sharing the news and said it is especially worrying now the evenings are darker and similar traps might be less visible than during the day.

Numerous traps targeting cyclists have been reported across the UK in recent years, one in the Rhondda Valley made from barbed wire causing cuts to a rider's throat that needed 17 stitches and left their partner "so glad I'm not planning a funeral right now".

Neck Injury via toe_cutter_71 on Instagram

Tony Roberts "had to unwrap the wire from around his neck", the trap having been "hidden in a tree line so it couldn't have been seen". The 39-year-old was treated by specialist doctors who initially wondered if he would need surgery but fortunately managed to treat the injury with stitches instead.

Earlier in the same year, police in Northumbria investigated a horrific "medieval" trap using sharpened stakes that was placed on a mountain biking trail near Newcastle.

More recently, a cyclist in North Wales was seriously injured, suffering a concussion, a broken collarbone and three fractured ribs, after being brought down by a wire trap stretched across a bike path. In September 2023, a Berkshire cyclist shared photos of trail "sabotage" on a popular bridleway in the county, a rope and bramble trap laid on the route.

The topic of traps targeting cyclists was thrust into the spotlight during lockdown when columnist Rod Liddle wrote in the Sunday Times that it is "tempting" to stretch piano wire across the road to target cyclists.

Cycling UK complained to the newspaper about the column, saying it was "inflammatory, in seriously poor taste" and condoned criminal act. The Sunday Times responded saying the column was "not intended to be taken seriously".

Dan is the road.cc news editor and joined in 2020 having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for The Non-League Paper. Dan has been at road.cc for four years and mainly writes news and tech articles as well as the occasional feature. He has hopefully kept you entertained on the live blog too.

Never fast enough to take things on the bike too seriously, when he's not working you'll find him exploring the south of England by two wheels at a leisurely weekend pace, or enjoying his favourite Scottish roads when visiting family. Sometimes he'll even load up the bags and ride up the whole way, he's a bit strange like that.

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10 comments

Avatar
Stephankernow | 4 weeks ago
1 like

I hope the perpetrator is caught and gaoled

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gazza_d | 1 month ago
12 likes

Acts like this should be regarded as domestic terrorism, because that's what it is.

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Hivizalways replied to gazza_d | 4 weeks ago
0 likes

Domestic terrorism? You made that up  2

Avatar
mdavidford replied to Hivizalways | 4 weeks ago
4 likes

Hivizalways wrote:

Domestic terrorism? You made that up  2

Apparently they went to the bother of writing a whole Wikipedia article just to back up their use of the term: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_terrorism

Not to mention hacking the likes of the FBI, Dept of Homeland Security, and gov.uk to plant uses of it there.

Avatar
hawkinspeter replied to mdavidford | 4 weeks ago
4 likes

mdavidford wrote:

Apparently they went to the bother of writing a whole Wikipedia article just to back up their use of the term: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_terrorism

Not to mention hacking the likes of the FBI, Dept of Homeland Security, and gov.uk to plant uses of it there.

That must have taken a lot of commitment to go back in time and add it to the 2001 Patriot Act

Avatar
chrisonabike replied to hawkinspeter | 4 weeks ago
2 likes

To be fair if this is our usual revenant they've got form in rewriting history...

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Cugel | 1 month ago
11 likes

A local councillor for the Grenoside ward told The Star the trap is a "really dangerous act" and the person responsible "needs to think again about what they are trying to do".

It's very obvious what the person responsible was trying to do. They were attempting GBH .... > murder. The councillor might instead ask what brought about this "thinking". The answer may be complex but it'll contain a Very Large Dollop of gutter(snipe) press encouragements with suggestions that cyclists are non-human vermin and are legitimate targets for extermination.

So the next question is: from whence comes the (successful) gutterpress selection of cyclists as pariahs, witches or enemies-within? The simple answer is: from the in-built nastiness of human nature with its tendency to desire out-groups to cruelly persecute. For details and a series of examples, see history, current events and the return to the human norms of the last 70,000 years after the teeny exception of the post WWII settlement in Europe (even Blightedland) now in tatters.

Cadres of sociologists and psychologists will offer much more detailed answers. None of them will contain any solution to the syndrome.

On the other hand, Mummy Nature is probably about to deal with the issue by exterminating the lot of us, just by allowing us to continue as we are as a species. We'll soon all disappear up our own fundamental orifices. The damage done will only take a few hundred thousand years to sweep away.

"Intelligent species".  Ha!

 

Avatar
the little onion | 1 month ago
15 likes

 Mr Butterworth warned riders who use the area to "be vigilant as there's an idiot kicking about again"

 

Sorry, but this isn't idiocy. It is a well planned, deliberate, act of violence.

Avatar
brooksby replied to the little onion | 1 month ago
7 likes

the little onion wrote:

Sorry, but this isn't idiocy. It is a well planned, deliberate, act of violence.

I'm pretty sure that an act of violence which is clearly deliberate and premeditated attracts a much harsher set of laws.  An act of domestic terrorism, anyone?

Avatar
chrisonabike replied to brooksby | 1 month ago
9 likes

Things to shout when attempting to harm people:
- religious slogan - life in prison
- misogynistic abuse - a few years (when it comes to court, sadly often only after someone dies)
- "let's knock some people off their bikes!" - stern talking to (for kids)
- "the sun was is in my eyes / get off the road!" - no punishment.

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