That smoky haze and weird orange light across the High Peak and Cheshire East border this afternoon is not just heat, it is the Peak District burning.
A significant moorland fire is ongoing at the top of the Goyt Valley, near to Derbyshire Bridge and the Cat & Fiddle. At least ten fire engines and multiple crews from across the two counties are in attendance. The road up the valley from Errwood Hall and the A537 are closed and should be avoided for the foreseeable.
No, this spring has not been normal. The ongoing (seemingly unreported) drought coupled now with unseasonably intense heat is frightening. When you’re phoning 999 for the first time in your life, you know the correct term is climate emergency.
That’s how a peaceful ride and wander up the Goyt Valley today panned out. Trying to beat the heat before it became too intense, then rounding the bend above Goytsclough Quarry to see a significant chunk of the valley side on fire.
Definitely not a ‘controlled’ burn; intense flames, rapidly spreading. Surely visible from the Cat & Fiddle road, surely already reported; but anyway: hello, fire please, the top of the Goyt Valley just north of Derbyshire Bridge car park is on fire. Dialling 999 is weird when you’ve never done it before.
They knew about something nearer Errwood, I could see that too (a far smaller smoke plume, hard to judge where it was, hopefully not my bike.) What3words given. People who spend their lives battling such terrifying things were on their way. My god, what a task. Thoughts with them.
I needed to turn around anyway, realising that to drop down and cross the river I’d gone too far beyond the scorched earth former larch plantation above Goytsclough. I walked away from the unfolding hell, thankfully up into the wind and clear air of Burbage Edge.
Note the pattern of patchwork mown moorland surrounding the blaze. United Utilities has apparently promised not to renew grouse shooting leases on its estates and I’ve heard mumbles of a new moorland management regime in this area (Peak Park volunteers have recently been planting sphagnum in some nearby areas of Goyt Moss), but hard facts about how these moors are managed are hard to come by. Right now, with the almost complete lack of recent rainfall, they are bone dry; audibly crackling. It’s a wonder anything is growing.
Eventually back near Errwood, determining it was safe to retrieve my bike (thankfully not incinerated), the high smoke plume was starting to shade the landscape, an apocalyptic orange sun just breaking through and evident all the way back down the valley to Whaley Bridge and beyond. People still driving in and just setting off for walks felt rather like a real-life version of that “this is fine” burning room meme.
As this major event is still ongoing, no precise ignition for the blaze is known. Maybe we’ll never know. Barbecue, glass bottle, cigarette, arson? (Another burning stolen vehicle? Seems a monthly occurrence lately.) Above the roadside, it doesn’t appear to be an area that’s even walked, really, at all.
However, we do know two key reasons why a moorland fire like this can take hold and spread so rapidly and devastatingly, no matter who’s stupid enough to let it start.
One is the longstanding and systemic draining and drying of land (for the management of grouse to be shot, or otherwise). These moors should be holding onto more water, they should not be drying so quickly. Whatever the current status of the practice here, the moors of Goyts Moss owned by United Utilities have been ravaged over decades by ‘management’ that’s only now just beginning to change for the better. (That doesn’t even have to be my opinion, they have apparently decided themselves what they’ve been doing for so long is wrong.)
And of course the other is the climate emergency. Changing temperatures, more extreme weather. Caused primarily by human lifestyles. An emergency happening today in the Peak District, and in the smoky sky perhaps right above you.
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