'Very serious' blaze rips through Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire

Firefighters are now investigating the cause of the major blaze that destroyed the cooling towers at the gas-fuelled facility.

16:56 20 October 2014

After a "very serious" fire ripped through Didcot Power Station destroying the cooling towers at the gas-fuelled facility prompting 65 firefighters, twelve fire engines and three hydraulic platforms to the site, investigators are now probing what caused the fire. 

 

Officials shut down the site quickly to stop the incident before turning into an inferno, in scenes described by Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue as “very serious.”

 

Energy Secretary Ed Davey gave an assurance that the fire will not impact on electricity supplies and that the engineers would work hard to get the site up and running as soon as possible. 

 

"My priority is to understand the cause of the fire and get the affected unit back generating electricity as soon as it's safe to do so," he said.

 

Meanwhile, Oxfordshire's chief fire officer, David Etheridge told Sky News: "It was a very serious fire. Our crews have been working very hard in very difficult conditions.” 

 

"These fires are always very tricky for us. Water and electricity don't mix but we've worked with the site management on plans and we do exercises to make sure that when we do get an incident such as this we can all work seamlessly together to get it under control."