Major incident declared after 5km wildfire nears RAF base in Yorkshire

A major incident has been declared as a huge fire ripping through Yorkshire, threatening to engulf an RAF base, rages on.

The blaze began in Langdale Moor on Monday and has now burned through around 5 square kilometres of moorland.

Drone footage shows a long line of smoke filling the air as fire incinerates more and more of the natural habitat close to the ballistic missile early warning base at RAF Fylingdales.

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (NYFRS) has now deployed over 100 firefighters and 20 fire pumps to try and contain the fire.

They said in an update today: ‘The fire has now spread and is covering around 5 sq km.’

‘More resources are being sent to the scene. This has now been declared a major incident.’

Fire crews were first dispatched to the area at around 6.30pm on Monday after reports of smoke, with locals told to keep doors and windows shut.

At one point, the fire even ‘jumped’ a fire break put in place on late on Monday.

After that, the fire reduced in size on Tuesday night, it then spread further during the day on Wednesday.

The NYFRS group manager Tony Peel told the BBC there was ‘no timescale whatsoever’ for putting out the fire.

He said he expected the fire to die down overnight and that fire fighters would have a new plan on Thursday to extinguish the blaze.

The moor fires has also paused steam train services run by the North Yorkshire Moors Railway.

They said in a statement: ‘Due to the prolonged hot weather and recent fires elsewhere in the county which have meant firefighting resources have been more stretched, we’ve taken the decision to delay the start of the special No. 60163 “Tornado” services set to run on 15th, 16th and 17th August.

‘In addition, we’ve switched all of our Pickering to Grosmont standard services to heritage diesel locomotives, and we still aim to run steam-hauled services between Grosmont and Whitby due to the lower fire risk profile.

‘The NYMR is doing everything it can to fully cooperate with and support the emergency services, taking every precaution to ensure the safety of our staff, volunteers and passengers, which is always our priority.’

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