{"id":699447,"date":"2026-01-16T08:03:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T08:03:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/699447\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T08:03:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T08:03:13","slug":"scots-fire-crews-had-to-call-backup-from-100-miles-away-amid-fears-savage-cuts-putting-lives-at-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/699447\/","title":{"rendered":"Scots fire crews had to call backup from 100-miles away amid fears savage cuts ‘putting lives at risk’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"An<\/p>\n

A FIRE crew had to rush more than 100 miles to a fire after nearby equipment broke down.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s feared lives could have been put at risk during the blaze in Whithorn, Wigtonshire<\/a>, which needed to be tackled by a high reach appliance.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you!\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

It sparked fears lives could have been put at riskCredit: Supplied<\/p>\n

A replacement crew was sent from 100 miles away in Maryhill, GlasgowCredit: The Sun<\/p>\n

But when the closest one \u2013 60 miles away in Dumfries \u2013 broke down at the scene and couldn\u2019t be used, one from the Maryhill area of Glasgow<\/a> had to be summoned.<\/p>\n

The backup crew had to travel 98 miles to the incident, which took them over two-and-a-half hours. They were called out 5.42am and arrived on the scene at 8.19am.<\/p>\n

Luckily nobody was hurt in the blaze on January 1 which started on the town\u2019s George Street around 11.45pm.<\/p>\n

It was claimed the incident shows how fragile Scotland\u2019s fire and rescue service is.<\/p>\n

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Scottish Conservative shadow community safety<\/a> minister Sharon Dowey MSP said: \u201cThis incident exposes how the SNP have stripped Scotland\u2019s fire service to the bone.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith an appliance from Glasgow<\/a> out of action 100 miles away, the consequences could have been devastating.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is time for the SNP to properly fund our fire service and stop putting public safety at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her Scottish Labour<\/a> counterpart Katy Clark added: \u201cThis astonishing case lays bare the consequences of the SNP\u2019s dangerous<\/a> cuts<\/a> to fire services.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMost read in The Scottish Sun\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery single second counts in a fire and long waits for help can be catastrophic.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is shocking that it took multiple hours and a 100 mile trip for a high reach vehicle to get to this fire.\u201d<\/p>\n

The nearest high rise appliance to the Whithorn incident was based in Kilmarnock, which was unavailable to be sent.<\/p>\n

After the Maryhill crew were deployed, the nearest ones were based in Castlemilk in the city\u2019s East End, Johnstone in Renfrewshire and Coatbridge, Lanarkshire<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The last round of cutbacks saw high reach appliances taken away from stations in Clydebank, Ayr, Clydesmill and Motherwell.<\/p>\n

Last month, a huge fire at the Revolver Hotel in Glasgow\u2019s Merchant City required two of the high reach vehicles to tackle the blaze which had spread to the roof.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cWith an appliance from Glasgow out of action 100 miles away, the consequences could have been devastating.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tSharon Dowey MSP\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Area Commander Derek Heaton, the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service\u2019s local senior officer for Dumfries and Galloway said: \u201cWe were alerted at 11.46pm on Thursday, 1 January, to reports of a dwelling fire at George Street, Whithorn.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe mobilised four appliances to the scene, with the first fire appliance arriving as of 11.56pm.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were no casualties, and crews left the scene at around 4pm on Friday, 2 January.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cA height appliance originally mobilised from Dumfries Community Fire Station experienced a mechanical issue at the scene and had to be withdrawn.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur highly trained Operations Control staff mobilised a separate high reach appliance from Maryhill Community Fire Station, which arrived at the scene as of 8.19am on Friday, 2 January.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important to recognise that our height appliances are strategically located national resources which are deployed to locations across the country as and when required.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur specially trained operations control staff continually monitor real time data to ensure we attend every emergency with the right resources at the right time.\u201d<\/p>\n

It comes as we revealed how the Coatbridge high rise appliance had to be sent to a fire 50 miles away in Ayr<\/a> to backup a Kilmarnock crew, just months after Ayr lost their high reach vehicle.<\/p>\n

In September 2023, At last September\u2019s inferno at the Station Hotel, Ayr, a high-reach engine was summoned from Glasgow.<\/p>\n

A high reach fire appliance broke down at the scene in DumfriesCredit: Supplied\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A FIRE crew had to rush more than 100 miles to a fire after nearby equipment broke down.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":699448,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7826],"tags":[748,918,4884,209,712,1143,16,15],"class_list":["post-699447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-glasgow","tag-britain","tag-glasgow","tag-great-britain","tag-longtail","tag-scotland","tag-scottish-fire-and-rescue-service","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115903739106049495","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699447\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/699448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}