Exciting week

Bev has had rather an exciting week whilst commuting to work - firstly, she was driving along the Leighton Buzzard bypass on Monday morning when she spotted huge flames on the hillside, near Totternhoe quarry. She thought it looked like a "controlled" fire, so didn't worry too much about it, but it was still blazing furiously when she drove home at night. On Tuesday morning, she could see the fire from as far away as Toddington - wow, this was a massive blaze indeed, with a plume of black smoke drifting into the sky and bright orange flames visible from the road over a mile away! But Bev also spotted blue flashing lights near the fire, so she knew that the fire brigade were attending the incident and that it was anything but a "controlled" fire.

After checking on the internet, Bev discovered that someone had set fire to a massive pile of wood and rubbish, and the fire was too big for the fire brigade to safely extinguish so they were monitoring the situation and leaving it to burn itself out, which they expected to happen in a couple of days! That was wishful thinking - on Thursday night it was still burning merrily away on the hillside, looking like the film of forest fires we see in the US or Europe!

And to add to the excitement, there was an accident when a rubbernecker slowed down to admire the views of the fire and the car behind ran into him!

Oh, and Bedfordshire Police and Fire Brigade have asked drivers to stop phoning to say there is a fire on the hills near Leighton Buzzard - THEY KNOW!