Easter Fires Devastate Moors

The Easter weekend was blighted by moorland and grass fires pretty much throughout the UK with dry conditions and fresh winds causing havoc.

There was a colossal 10 square km blaze on Bleaklow above Glossop in the Peak that left the OUTDOORSmagic windowsill smutty with smoke particles and cloaked the entire town centre in an eerie blanket of smoke throughout Friday. A smaller fire started on Kinder on Thursday, but proved to be easier to control and there were other outbreaks further north on Saddleworth Moor and to the south, near the Roaches in Staffordshire.

According to this BBC story, the situation has been helped by heavy rain yesterday, but fire fighters using helicopters to drop water are still dealing with hot spots in the Bleaklow and Black Hill areas. They will also be using 'water injection' techniques to cool smouldering peat.

The Peak was just one of many areas hit. In North Wales fire fighters reportedly tackled as many as 200 gorse and moorland fires last week including one on the Migneint mountain, near Blaenau Ffestiniog and others near Dolgellau and the Menai Bridge. There were also fires in mid-Wales, though overnight rain seems to have extinguished most of them.

It was similar story in Scotland, though the scale of some of the forest fires there means that according to the Independent - see this story - some six are still burning including a 45 square kilometre forest and moorland blaze on the Ardnamurchan peninsula. More Scottish fire info on Ananova and the BBC. More rain is forecast.

Started Deliberately?

It seems that at least some of the fires may have been started deliberately with Peak Park chief ranger Sean Prendergast reported as saying that 'We suspect that one of them at least is arson. We don't yet have firm evidence of that but there is a strong suspicion.'

Other likely culprits are discarded cigarette butts. The flammable peat means that a fag end can smoulder for hours before igniting with devastating results given the dryness of the ground and vegetation. Remarkably there were still walkers smoking on Kinder at the weekend even with a fire burning just miles away.

Ironically on 17 April, the Peak Park Authority issued a plea for people to 'take special care' to avoid starting fires - see this press release - stressing that the recent dry spell has created conditions that are more normally seen in the summer.