Emergency services are asking parents to talk to their children about the dangers of entering derelict buildings and starting deliberate fires.
Since May 2024, emergency services across Nottinghamshire have been responding to a growing number of deliberate fires in Nottingham city centre, specifically at the Guild Hall site.
The first fire occurred on Monday 27 May, and between then and Sunday 7 July, Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service has attended nine incidents at the derelict building in South Sherwood Street. Eight of these incidents were primary and secondary fires, which were all set deliberately by young people.
Our response across this six-week period used over 40 resources – including fire engines, specialist equipment and officer’s – which takes vital skills away from other emergencies, posing a risk to life.
Setting deliberate fires is dangerous in many ways, and has serious consequences, therefore, to prevent these from happening further, there was a multi-agency approach, and preventatives have been put in place to stop people entering the building. This has thankfully been successful, and since working collaboratively with Nottingham City Council we have only attended one incident at the Grade-II listed building since 7 July, and this was a false alarm.
Assistant Chief Fire Officer, Damien West, said: “Starting fires deliberately can be extremely harmful to those setting the fires, others within the local community and the environment. It’s a great risk to themselves and a drain on resources for fire, police, and ambulance services.
“We are urging parents to educate their children and know where they are at all times, especially throughout the summer holidays – it is incredibly dangerous for anyone to be playing with fire.
“It is also an additional risk when they are entering derelict buildings like the Guild Hall site. There are a lot of hazards where they can easily get hurt. If one of these fires were to get out of hand, we could have been faced with a serious incident, and even loss of life, which is something we never want to be dealing with.
“Thankfully since working with our partners to close access to the site, the fires have stopped – this is a successful example of us working closely and collaboratively with other organisations to create safer communities.
“Whilst we continue to do work to reduce deliberate fire setting across Nottinghamshire, we want to remind the public that you can help us stamp out arson by telling us what you know about fire-setting in your area. You can report information anonymously via an online form or by calling 0800 169 5558.”
A Nottingham City Council spokesperson said: “We would reiterate the warnings from the fire service about breaking into vacant sites and deliberately starting fires. We continue to liaise closely with them and the police to prevent this from happening.
“A lot of work goes into securing the Guild Hall and the council has gone above and beyond the legal requirements of managing a large vacant site like this, but still people are risking their lives by forcing a way in.
“This is dangerous and diverts blue-light crews away from dealing with emergencies elsewhere in our city, while it’s important to be clear that it is taxpayers’ money being spent on the site being secured.”
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