Climate protesters brought a U.S. Open semifinal match to a halt Thursday night as they chanted for their cause in the upper stands, with one of them supergluing his bare feet to the stadium’s floor.
The incident unfolded around 8 p.m., just as players Coco Gauff and Karolina Muchova were starting the second set of their semifinal.
Videos shared on social media show two men and a woman standing up and shouting from their seats in the upper stands, wearing shirts that say “End Fossil Fuels.” They’re met with a chorus of boos from surrounding spectators, as a security guard threatens to kick them out.
Police eventually responded and escorted the protesters away, though responders had to step in to safely unstick activist Shayok Mukhopadhyay from his spot, according to the NYPD. It’s unclear how exactly they did that.
Police said they arrested Mukhopadhyay, 50, of White Plains, New York for trespassing and disorderly conduct. They also arrested 35-year-old Gregory Schwedock, of Manhattan, for trespass. Both were given desk appearance tickets.
The fracas and police response caused the match to be delayed by about 50 minutes.
The protesters say they represent the group Extinction Rebellion NYC. In a press release, they claimed not to be protesting tennis itself for its role in fossil fuel emissions, but rather the government’s weak response to the climate crisis.
“We are not protesting the emissions that brought spectators to get here. That’s not the point,” said Mukhopadhyay in a written statement. “We are here because we have to disrupt this public event as our last resort to draw public attention to the climate emergency we are facing today.”
The U.S. Open in Queens is one of the premier events in professional tennis and draws an audience from across the globe.
Miles Grant, Extinction Rebellion spokesperson, said the minor disruption was no worse than the kinds of delays extreme weather has already caused at matches around the world.
“Just…
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