THE ATTEMPTED car-bombing of Glasgow Airport had a direct effect on the chaos that descended at this year’s T in the Park on the Friday evening, it emerged last night, writes Alan Wilson, Rocktalk reporter.

In addition to the downpours and ankle-deep mud which rendered car parks inaccessible and eventually forced their closure, leaving thousands stranded for hours in 12-mile traffic jams, increased security measures saw two hard-access car parks closed before the event.

The loss of those car parks exacerbated the problems, which organisers say ended up almost insurmountable due to the sheer volume of rain.

The weather resulted in quagmires of slippery mud, mainly in the car park entrances, which left drivers with nowhere to go, resulting in massive tailbacks.

The knock-on effects, a local community council heard on Tuesday, were that residents claimed they were trapped in their homes, unable to get cars out of their drives to get to work.

Others said they were “disgusted” after being faced with festival-goers urinating in gardens after drinking heavily and being stuck in their cars.

That has led to calls from some residents for T in the Park to have its licence revoked by Perth and Kinross Council.

DF Concerts chief executive Geoff Ellis said, “We don’t want to make light of what happened because there were serious problems for us and the local residents. It’s not an excuse but it’s the first time in 14 years there has been a serious traffic problem at T in the Park.

“We are very experienced in this but we’ve got to avoid a repeat of what happened.

“Two of our main car parks, the ones nearest the arena entrance, were out of action because of the increased security.

“These have hard surface road access and we believe that would have helped to keep the traffic moving into those car parks if they were available.

“That’s what made the big difference, but we were focused on safety when we were planning the festival and we spent a lot of time putting those increased security measures in place.

“Everyone put in a tremendous effort in the run-up to the event and possibly we weren’t as fresh on the Friday as we would normally be.

“The main thing is how to avoid those problems in the future. We are aware of what went wrong and we want to take it forward.

“We have apologised for what happened and we are very sorry, but there were so many contributory factors outwith our control that we can’t really be blamed for.

“Our main focus now is to take the lessons learned and make sure we improve things for next year.

Chief Superintendent Matt Hamilton of Tayside Police confirmed yesterday that due to the threat level being raised to critical, some car parking arrangements were altered due to their proximity to the security fence.

However he believed none were shut that would have made any difference to the bigger picture regarding weather conditions.