DOVER, England (Reuters) – Truck drivers scuffled with police and sounded their horns in protest around the English port of Dover as a partial blockade by France designed to contain a highly infectious coronavirus variant angered thousands stranded before Christmas.

Paris and London agreed late on Tuesday that drivers carrying a negative test result could board ferries for Calais from Wednesday after much of the world shut its borders to Britain to contain the new mutated variant.

A British minister said the military would start testing drivers but he warned that it would take time to clear the backlog, hammering Britain’s most important trade route for food just days before it leaves the European Union’s orbit.

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Huge queues of trucks have been stacked on a motorway towards the Eurotunnel Channel Tunnel and Dover in the southeast county of Kent, while others have been parked on the former nearby airport at Manston.

TV footage showed drivers honking their truck horns and flashing lights in unison in protest.

As tempers flared in Dover, there were brief scuffles between drivers, angered that they will not be able to get home to their families before Christmas, and a small number of police officers.

The Road Haulage Association, which estimated there were up to 10,000 trucks being held up in Kent, said the situation was chaos as the testing system was not yet ready.

"What we’ve got this morning is very, very angry truckers in Dover,” Rod McKenzie, managing director of policy for the RHA, told BBC TV. "They’re tired, frustrated, desperately want to get home for Christmas.”