Climate change ‘to blame’ as wildfire alert issued for Easter
Families enjoying the Easter break in Scotland have been warned to “exercise extreme caution” due to a high wildfire risk after a number of blazes.
Six campers, including two teenagers, had to be rescued by helicopter early on Saturday as flames — some said to be more than a metre high — tore across the Galloway Forest Park and spread into Ayrshire.
The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) has already issued three extreme wildfire risk warnings this spring and Ian McMeekin, the area commander, said he expected another to follow later this week.
A fire in the Kilpatrick Hills, north of Glasgow
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Wildfires in northern parts of Britain tend to peak in the spring, when vegetation has been dried out by frost and the sun warms up. However, Scottish authorities now fear that longer drier springs — such as the one this year — are turning grass and heather uplands into kindling that is easily ignited by something as simple as a discarded glass bottle.
NatureScot, a government environment watchdog and regulator, has been trying to help landowners re-wet parts of Scotland, helping to slow or stop wildfires at this time of year.
Helen Doherty, the quango’s uplands and peatlands officer, said: “The effects of climate change are already being felt in Scotland. Higher temperatures and droughts can increase the risk of wildfires which can cause significant damage to our wildlife and habitats.”
SFRS said on Monday that it was making progress against the blaze in the southwest of Scotland after mobilising 20 crews and two helicopters but feared more problems over the next few days.
McMeekin said: “We recognise that a lot of families and communities will be looking to enjoy the good weather and make use of the scenery we have.
“What we’d ask people is if you’re enjoying the countryside to follow the rules, to make sure you don’t leave any rubbish, to make sure you’re careful with the scattered cigarettes and if people are cooking to make sure that barbecues are not left unattended and are disposed of properly afterwards.”
Kenny Barbour, the deputy assistant chief officer at SFRS, asked the public to “exercise extreme caution and think twice before using anything involving a naked flame”.
He added: “Responsible human behaviour can significantly lower the chance of a wildfire starting, so it is crucial that people act safely in rural environments and always follow the Scottish Outdoor Access Code.”
Six campers had to be rescued from a fire in Galloway Forest Park at the weekend
FERNANDA MARBROW
Stewart Gibson, of Galloway Mountain Rescue, told Sky News: “Things are calming down a bit now. I think the SFRS has got it under control, but we’re not out of danger yet.
“The forecast with these dry conditions is to continue over the next week, so we just have to wait and see what happens.”
The Galloway blaze, which McMeekin said was first reported on Thursday in Glen Trool, comes after a series of other fires in recent weeks.
Moors, fields and grasslands have lit up in Inverpolly in Wester Ross; in the Kilpatrick Hills north of Glasgow; near Lake of Menteith in Stirlingshire; in Torry, Aberdeen, and south of Inverness.
Angela Constance, the justice secretary, has convened the Scottish government’s Resilience Room (SGoRR) to monitor the situation.
Experts — including those advising the government — do not predict the kind of fires that hit Los Angeles this year, destroying billions in property, or the choking forest fires seen in Canada and Siberia in recent years, in Scotland.
The road connecting Achiltibuie with Drumrunie north of Ullapool was closed after a fire on the hillside
IAIN MASTERTON
However they warn that more hill fires could start to affect public health through lower air and water quality, damage to vital transport links and the rural economy.
Rory Hadden, professor of fire science at Edinburgh University, said such wider risks were worth considering. “It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that we see a fire closing down an airport because of the smoke,” he said.
Asked if he thought wildfires were on the rise, he added: “Probably, yes. We are getting long dry spells, as we are seeing now. But we are also seeing the opposite, which are more periods of extreme rain.”
Scotland had 64 per cent of its average rainfall in March, according to official data from the Met Office, while the mean temperature for March was 1.7°C higher than average.
Hadden believes the SFRS are getting their strategy right on wildfires, learning from best practice in countries such as Australia. But he thinks the public needs to understand some of the dangers and risks during wildfire season.
Rory Hadden, professor of fire science at Edinburgh University, stressed the importance of countryside skills in containing and preventing wildfires
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He said: “At this time of year there’s often quite a lot of last year’s growth, dead material, still within plants like heather and gorse. And that will respond really quite rapidly to these conditions of relatively low humidity. All it takes is a bit of sunshine and wind — and any kind of ignition source, deliberate or accidental.”
An engineer by training, Hadden also stressed the importance of countryside skills in containing and preventing wildfires. He said that farmers and land managers know how to build barriers, how to use wetlands and roads and rivers to hold back flames. That is one of the reasons he does not support a ban on muirburn — when landowners have controlled fires on hillsides.
Jack and Frankie, both 13, were rescued by coastguard helicopter crew along with their fathers Bruce Marbrow and Scott Raynor
FERNANDA MARBROW
The six rescued at the weekend included Bruce Marbrow and Scott Raynor and their respective 13-year-old sons, Jack and Frankie. The group had no idea that wildfires had started to spread when they pitched tents near Loch Valley in Galloway Forest Park on Friday evening.
They were separated from flames only by a small stream. The authorities realised the group was missing when they saw their vehicle in a car park. Marbrow, an experienced camper, had shared the location where they intended to camp with his wife, allowing the authorities to locate them and evacuate them by helicopter in the early hours of Saturday.
Initially the coastguard crew did not see the group when they first passed over at 3am. Helicopters had been deployed to water-bomb the Galloway fire over the weekend.
“Being typical British, we didn’t want to cause a scene,” Marbrow, from Humberside, told The Scotsman. “But the helicopter, which we thought could see us at the time, actually hadn’t seen us and went off. At about 4am it came back and it was clear they saw us.
“A few lads jumped off and said we needed to get on board quick as they just had minutes of fuel left. They had been looking for us. They were amazingly calm. But it was a case of ‘grab your car keys, phones, and run’. We had to leave all our kit.”