Dry weather has left firefighters facing a tough battle as raging Wildfires spread through Britain's forests.

[Pastor Dale Morgan]

Perilous Times and Climate Change

Dry weather has left firefighters facing a tough battle as raging Wildfires spread through Britain's forests.


By David Harrison 9:30AM BST 08 May 2011
The Telegraph UK

The sweat and grime merge in grey rivulets on Tim Elliott's face as the 26-year-old firefighter pauses to survey the apocalyptic scene.

Deep in a Berkshire forest, amid the charred, skeletal trees, dozens of plumes of smoke rise from the scorched earth, some bursting into bright orange flames.

Watch manager Elliot and his team, wearing masks to stop them inhaling the thick fumes, move swiftly, dousing the flames and the spiralling smoke, metre by metre, plume by plume.

It seems a hopeless task. The smoke is rising everywhere. The firefighters are in a dense part of Swinley Forest, near Ascot, inaccessible to their fire engine, so they have to use portable "backpack hoses", and keep returning to their machine for refills.

"It's painstaking work," Mr Elliott says, with considerable understatement. "But we have to keep doing this, bit by bit.

"It's the biggest fire we've seen in this area. The hot weather and the wind are making it worse. We need rain – lots of rain."

Hundreds of firefighters have spent most of the past week tackling forest fires which have left vast areas of blackened land in many parts of the UK and surprised experts with their scale and intensity.

Police suspect that the fires were caused by arsonists and people being careless with barbecues and discarded cigarettes. Two 14-year-old boys were arrested and bailed on suspicion of arson in Berkshire last week.

The blazes took hold quickly because the trees, bracken and other vegetation were "tinder box dry" after the hottest April on record, which saw only a fifth of the expected rainfall in England and Wales, according to David Williamson, a Forestry Commission director.

Strong winds meant that the fires swept across firebreaks, leaving a trail of devastation and causing families to be evacuated from homes near the forests in Berkshire, Lancashire, Yorkshire, and many parts of Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland.

The 50-ft high, raging fires that swept across Swinley Forest, a beauty spot popular with horse-riders, walkers and picnickers, early last week have been brought under control.

But the firefighters' work is far from over. The forest has a peat floor which retains heat and is keeping the fire smouldering underground in an area of around 3sq km.

The smoke breaks through to the surface, often bursting into flames and firefighters, with up to 40 fire engines, are working round the clock to extinguish every fire and douse every cloud of smoke in the "hotspots" to prevent the blazes from taking off again.

"What we've got essentially is a vast underground fire which can erupt on to the surface anywhere in this area," said a spokesperson for the Berkshire fire and rescue service.

Rain showers provided some relief in many parts of the country yesterday (SAT) and more are expected today but experienced firefighters said the forests needed at least two weeks of rain, or the equivalent from the fire services, before they would be completely safe.

"Realistically, what we are doing is a controlled burn," said a senior fire officer in Berkshire.

Some firefighters have suffered heat exhaustion, sore throats and blisters, but they work without complaint, sustaining each other with teasing banter.

Out in the forest, support staff in four-wheel drives provide the firefighters with food and large quantities of drinking water to protect them from dehydration.

The firefighters do, at least, have a powerful new weapon to help them: the 14-ton Unimog, an all-terrain firefighting machine that shoots powerful jets of foam and water from a cannon and two huge hoses.

It carries 4,500 litres of water and can, if required, fire water at a total of up to 1,000 litres a minute. Brought into service only last month, the Unimog is driven behind a Forestry Commission cutting machine that carves a "firebreak" track though the forest to give the firefighters access to the blazes.

Despite the advanced technology, it is arduous work. The hoses, heavy with water, have to be carried to the fires and held while they extinguish the flames.

Watch manager Dave Medley, 50, and his crew from Surrey fire and rescue service, were diverted to Swinley Forest where they spent six hours non-stop fighting the fires on Friday.

"The Unimog is really helping us but there's still a lot of work to do here, "said Mr Medley, a firefighter for 26 years.

The villagers in Crowthorne are full of gratitude and admiration for the firefighters. But nine families in particular have a special reason to be grateful. They were evacuated from eight timber cottages in Brookers Way – and a nearby house - on the edge of the village on Monday.

Claire Roantree, 39, a solicitor, had enjoyed "a lovely May fair" in Crowthorne village last Monday, with her husband Neil, 38 and children Oliver, three and Amelia, 19 months. They had watched dancing, enjoyed a drink and bought some new plants for their home.

But when they returned home, the road was closed and they were told to evacuate the house "as soon as possible".

"I panicked a bit," Mrs Roantree said. "I was a bit numb. My husband said it was just a house but I said it's more than that, it's memories too, and things we have worked towards for years."

The family went to stay with Mrs Roantree's sister Nicky in Crowthorne.

"The first night I woke up and 5am and could hear a helicopter in the sky and I wondered if my house was still there," the solicitor said.

Kelly Hutchinson and his wife Simone, both 35, their children aged five and three and Mr Hutchinson's 71-year-old mother Sylvia, were told by police to leave at around 7.45pm.

"I packed a case grabbed some photographs, and we left," Mrs Hutchinson said. "I was in tears. I didn't think we would have a house to go back to."

The family are staying with Mrs Hutchinson's mother in Farnham, 20 miles away. "We just want to get back home now," Mr Hutchinson said.

Bernard Edwards, 59, who runs a software business recently given the Queen's award for industry, was on holiday in Greece when his 28-year-old son called him to say a forest fire was raging near his large house on Bracknell Rd

He and his wife Pam flew back, feeling anxious, not knowing what they would find when they got home to the house, set in six acres, where they have lived for 20 years.

The couple were allowed, with a fire service escort, to gather a few belongings from their house before moving in with friends in Sandhurst village.

"We had 20 minutes to get our stuff," he said. "It was smokey and difficult to breathe. We knew that the fires could spread at any minute.

"The fire service saved our house. Our garden is in bloom while just yards across the road the forest is black. We are very relieved."

The families hope to move back in to their homes soon. But, when the fires are finally extinguished, they will all be asking the question posed by Jess James, 42, a firefighter for 16 years: "If this can happen in April in May, what could happen in July and August?"