The current heatwave could turn the countryside into an inferno costing millions of pounds in lost crops and expensive machinery warns the UK's leading rural insurer, NFU Mutual.
With the onset of harvesting and the summer holidays, David Leavesley of the insurer's risk management division, said: “The tinder-dry conditions and continuing heatwave pose a major fire risk to the countryside, threatening crops, equipment and even personal safety.”
In a 24-hour period fire brigades throughout southern England, including 40 in Essex, have already dealt with dozens of fires in crops, grass, hedgerows and open countryside.
Leavesley added: “We would urge everyone who lives, works in or visits the countryside to be aware of the risks and to apply care and common sense to reduce the number fires.”
Farmers have been urged to carry drums of water on combines to cool down the machines and to fill crop sprayers with water to dampen down vulnerable crops or quickly extinguish fires before they spread.
