A fuel giveaway gimmick in Melbourne’s west devolved into chaos as motorists snarled traffic around the block before police had to step in.
RS Rewards announced earlier this week it would be giving away $100,000 worth of fuel at the Liberty petrol station in Truganina from 10am on Good Friday.
But as keen motorists arrived, the station quickly became overwhelmed, with cars blocking intersections and lining nearby streets waiting for their shot at a free tank of fuel.
Sharing the craziness throughout the morning on his Instagram page, organiser Billy Beasley said people began lining up for the free fuel since 4am.
“There is a line that goes all the way around the block,” he said on Friday morning. “This is crazy. I didn’t expect this many people. We’re still two hours early and people have been here since 4am.”
Images captured by the Nine News helicopter showed hundreds of cars jammed at intersections and queuing down the road. Police cars and officers were also seen standing among the madness directing the traffic.
Then, less than an hour later, Beasley broke the news to motorists that authorities had been forced to shut the operation down.
“I do apologise guys, we’ve been shut down by the police earlier than expected,” he said. “It is a shame, however we did manage to give away a lot of fuel.
“Unfortunately, it just caused way too much chaos on the roads. We didn’t expect it to be this crazy, we do apologise for anyone who got affected.”
Beasley told this masthead he’d been inspired to do the giveaway after witnessing a shocking act at the petrol bowser last week.
“In the time that it took for me to get from my petrol pump to get to the counter to pay for my fuel, someone’s ran over with a jerry can and filled up $15 worth of petrol using my hose, hoping that I just wouldn’t notice and I’d pay for his fuel as well,” he said.
“That just sort of gave me a real outlook on the situation and really understand how serious it is. I mean, if this is what people are doing, and we’re scamming each other at petrol stations now, if [prices] get any worse, it could start getting violent.”
He said his team were still planning to take the giveaways around the country and weren’t disheartened by today’s chaos.
“It did get a little bit out of hand, and we’ve never done anything like this before, but this is just stuff that we’re going to take into the future,” he said.
Beasley said motorists had already taken advantage of $75,000 out of the planned $100,000, but that after the police shut them down, his team handed out another $50,000 in fuel vouchers.
“It’s really perked us all up, you know, thinking about what’s next for the future. It feels amazing.”
In a statement, police said officers attended the petrol station at 7.30am to “assist with traffic directions”.
“Police established several hazards due to the increased traffic and engaged event organisers. Organisers worked with police and established an alternative way to run the promotion, which is understood to be in the form of vouchers that can be used later.”
They said police remained at the site throughout the day to manage “the risks associated with the increased traffic”.
One driver told Nine News he had left home on a nearly empty tank, before completely running out while waiting in line.
“It doesn’t get any more desperate than this, man, especially with how gas prices are these days.”
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