Field fire engulfs children’s play area and buildings as week of blazes continues in Cambridgeshire
The alarming number of fires in Cambridgeshire this week has continued, with a field fire in Melbourn spreading to buildings and causing a children’s play area to go up in flames.
Crews were called at 6.26pm on Wednesday to London Way in Melbourn, where they found a field stubble fire that had spread to two separate buildings with wood yards and was engulfing a children’s slide and climbing frame.
Crews from Cottenham, Ely, Linton, Gamlingay, March, Ramsey and the water carrier from Huntingdon attended with an incident command unit, along with a crew from Essex Fire and Rescue Service, crews from Royston in Hertfordshire, Kempston in Bedfordshire and Haverhill in Suffolk.
They tackled the fire, which was started accidentally, into the evening and began scaling back around 8pm.
It followed another field fire hours earlier off Bassingbourn Road, in Litlington - the latest in a series to hit the county during the dry, hot weather,
Crews were called at 3.41pm on Wednesday to the accidental blaze and were on site until 9.40pm.
One crew from Cambridge, one crew from Gamlingay, two crews from St Neots and two crews from Hertfordshire Fire and Rescue Service attended, using hose reels and beaters to extinguish the flames.
A 11.10pm on Wednesday, a crew from Cambridge was called to an accidental small fire on a railway verge on Cambridge Road, Foxton. They used two hose reel jets to put it out and were back at their station by 12.20am.
Meanwhile, another crew from Cambridge was called at 11.44pm on Wednesday to another accidental fire in undergrowth on Puddicombe Way near Addenbrooke’s Hospital. Firefighters used one hose reel to put out the flames and were back at base by 12.40am.
The incidents continued on Thursday. At 8.37pm, crews from Cambridge were called to Whittlesford Road in Little Shelford, where an accidental one-tonne hay bale fire was spreading to 70 square metres of field. They were back at their stations by 12.10am on Friday.
Elsewhere in the county on Thursday, fire crews dealt with a skip fire in Netherton, Peterborough, a garage fire on Brynmore in Bretton, Peterborough, a shed fire in Wisbech, a car fire that was spreading to a house in Oldfield Avenue in Elm Part, Fenland and a deliberate fire involving trees, which was spreading to a house, in Cranemore in Werrington, Peterborough.
These came after a whole series of field fires, arson attacks and other accidental blazes earlier in the week, as the Cambridge Independent has reported.
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