A number of firefighters were called to assist some 400 cows at a dairy farm in the UK last night (Tuesday, February 26), the local fire service has confirmed.
Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service was called to help out a dairy farm in Newcastle whose water supply had failed.
The farm on Three Mile Lane, Newcastle, had suffered a failure of its water supply earlier in the day and was struggling to find an alternative putting its 400 head of dairy cows at risk of dehydration.
In desperation at around 10:40pm last night, the farmer rang the fire service to ask for assistance. A pump from Newcastle and the water carrier from Cheadle attended and delivered 8,500L of water.
Group manager Ian Housley said: “There was a genuine risk to the welfare of the cows and the farm staff were getting really concerned as they’d been doing their best to reinstate the water supply all day.
“So something had to be done to help. The easiest way for us to help them was to bring over the water carrier from Cheadle which we use when we need additional supplies of water at a large fire.
“Fortunately, not long after we’d provided the water, the farmer was able to re-establish the connection to ensure that two large on-site tanks could be continuously filled to provide water for the cows.
As a service, we’re quite often called upon to rescue animals but it’s not usually this many and there’s usually more physical effort involved!
“I’m just glad we were able to help the farm staff to keep the cows safe and well until a solution was found,” Housley concluded.
