Bonfire Night keeps firefighters occupied

Despite the fact that in some areas of the country such as Greater Manchester there were fewer reported fire-related incidents than in recent years, many fire crews were as busy as always.

In South Yorkshire, firefighters were called to more than 200 separate incidents across the region. Although most of these were for minor situations the control room still had to deal with plenty of calls.

A spokeswoman for South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service said:

“The majority of these were small jobs, controlling bonfires that had got out of control, small fires caused by fireworks and so on.

“It all kept our crews very busy but fortunately there were no really serious problems.”

Fire crews in Wales also found they were inundated with calls for help with over 70 emergency incidents across Swansea, Carmarthenshire and Neath Port Talbot over the weekend.

Firefighters had to respond to 45 outdoor fires across the region which needed to be tackled, while 30 incidents were found to be false alarms.

A spokesman for Mid and West Wales Fire Service said:

“The majority of calls were in the Aberavon area of Port Talbot and the Blaenymaes, Townhill and Hafod areas of Swansea.

“There were two incidents on Friday in the Llanelli area.

“We had 75 calls — 45 of which we took action on.”

Now Bonfire Night is over it is still important to consider fire risk, whether having a bonfire in the garden or ensuring there are working fire alarms in the home.