The snooker world championship has been the target of an unlikely protest after an activist tipped orange powder onto one of the tables during a match.
A man wearing a Just Stop Oil T-shirt interrupted the match between Robert Milkins and Joe Perry by jumping onto one of the tables and tipping out the substance.
Meanwhile, a woman was prevented from executing a similar stunt on an adjoining table. The dramatic moment was caught live on the BBC.
Play was suspended for the evening on the affected table, which will be re-covered overnight, while the match between Mark Allen and Fan Zhengyi resumed after a delay of approximately 45 minutes.
Seven-time champion Stephen Hendry, on commentary duties for the BBC, called the incident “scary” and admitted: “I have never seen that before at a snooker event. It’s a first.”
Just Stop Oil posted a video of the incident on their Twitter feed with the caption “New oil and gas will snooker us”.
The group wants Britain to stop all new oil and gas projects and has staged a number of protests.
At the weekend, 118 people were arrested at Aintree on Saturday as they tried to scale the perimeter fence at the Grand National.
Activists also threw soup over Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting at London’s National Gallery last October.
