A criminal gang reportedly stole £2 million worth of rare books by abseiling into a warehouse near Heathrow airport

Tom Cruise in “Mission: Impossible”YouTube/Movieclips

A gang of thieves has reportedly stolen over £2 million worth of rare books from a warehouse near Heathrow airport in a “Mission Impossible”-style heist, The Mail on Sunday reports.

The newspaper reports that over 160 rare books were stolen, including works by Galileo, Isaac Newton, and Leonardo da Vinci.

Thieves reportedly gained access to the warehouse in Feltham, Middlesex by climbing onto the roof, cutting holes through the reinforced skylights, and then abseiling down into the building.

The heist, which took place on the evening of January 29, was captured on the warehouse’s CCTV cameras, The Mail on Sunday reports.

Thieves were observed ignoring all other items stored in the warehouse, instead targeting four containers that stored rare books. A source told The Mail on Sunday that the gang of criminals checked the contents of the containers against a list, “throwing the ones they didn’t want away.” The books were being stored in the warehouse temporarily as they made their way to the California Book Fair.

The gang then placed the rare books into holdalls and pulled them onto the roof of the building using ropes. The bags were then placed into a van and driven away.

The Mail on Sunday reports that the thieves likely stole the books to order, as it would be difficult to resell the titles. The newspaper says that scientific works, of the type stolen in the raid, “are particularly in demand.” It speculates that a wealthy collector known as “the Astronomer” may have ordered gangs to steal books for him.

The most valuable book stolen in the raid is a 1566 edition of “De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium” by Copernicus. The book, which can be translated as “On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres,” set out Copernicus’ theory that the Sun is at the centre of the universe, not the Earth.

A copy of “De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium” that is similar to the one stolen in the raid.Flickr/Masa Sakano

The owner of the rare Copernicus book stolen in the raid, identified only as a dealer from Padua in Italy, told The Mail on Sunday that “It was clearly a robbery done to order. It was a specialised gang. They took only books, nothing else.”

The International League of Antiquarian Booksellers has published two separate lists detailing every book believed to have been stolen in the heist. It lists two dealers who have had stock stolen from them: Librario Bado e Mart s.a.s. di Bado R. e C. from Padua, Italy, and Michael Kühn from Berlin, Germany.

Another book that is believed to have been stolen is a 1656 Galileo book titled “Opere di Galileo Galilei,” another early scientific work about the universe.

A copy of “Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica” by Isaac Newton was also stolen in the raid. The book was a landmark work covering physics and mathematics.

Another copy of the stolen Isaac Newton book. Wikimedia/Paul Hermans

A 1506 edition of Dante’s “Divine Comedy” was also stolen in the raid.

The 1506 edition of Dante’s “Divine Comedy.”Cornell University Library