A REWARD of £1,500 has been offered after cheeky thieves pulled off one of the Forest's biggest-ever robberies – a huge 12-ton digger.
In the middle of the night they staged the audacious theft of the Sumitomo SW120 excavator at Mallett's Woods Works by:
•Breaking into the locked cab of the leviathan.
•Starting it up and negotiating three quarters of a mile of forest tracks without attracting attention.
•Driving it up a ramp onto a low-loader which met them near the Pygmy Pinetum nursery
•Spiriting away the £30,000 machine without trace.
North Somerset plant and machinery firm Molson Holdings had sent the excavator to Mallett's Woods Works, behind the bicycle hire outlet and the council yard near Cannop Ponds, for a fresh coat of paint.
It was delivered last Wednesday evening on a low-loader by a firm which Molson regularly contracts for this sort of work, said Robin Powell, who has taken out an advertisement in the Review offering £1,500 for information leading to the recovery of the excavator.
"It turned out the entrance to the yard was blocked and so the driver left it in the car park, so that the yard could take it in in the morning. The cab was locked, even though the machine has a permanent starter key," said Mr Powell.
"It seems they came back when everything was quiet – they would have to have done some quick thinking, though."
He said he was anxious to hear anything about the dull yellow machine which had the serial number 3714. Police were following up several leads but as yet nothing had materialised.
"I don't know how they managed to do it without being noticed. It must have taken some organising to arrange for a low loader to meet them and they must have known the area to be able to rendezvous at the end of the track."
Mr Powell can be contacted on 01934 876576.