Firefighters enter fourth day battling Elan Valley wildfires

Firefighters have entered their fourth day tackling wildfires in and around elan valley in Powys, with crews responding since Sunday near Claerwen Reservoir and Teifi Pools. A helicopter has been deployed to drop water on high-risk areas while people have been urged not to visit the area.

Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service said the response has stretched across a 70 sq mile, or 181 sq km, landscape of dams, reservoirs and rugged ground. National Trust Cymru has also closed Hafod Estate to the public as a precaution until further notice, and local residents have been asked to keep windows and doors closed if there is thick smoke.

Claerwen Reservoir and Teifi Pools

The affected area includes four dams — Craig Goch, Garreg Ddu, Pen y Garreg and Caban Coch — which were built more than 120 years ago to supply clean water to Birmingham and later to mid and south Wales. The scale of the place has complicated the fire response, with the water-drop helicopter being used where crews face the highest risk.

Glyndwr Jones, a shepherd who lives at Claerwen Dam, described the fire as “quite frightening”. He said, “As a shepherd, I think about the stock,” and added, “It’s a big, big area. Big farms up this area. What are we talking, between 10,000 and 12,000 acres - could be more even, but it’s a job to say,”

Glyndwr Jones at Claerwen Dam

Jones has worked as a shepherd for the Elan Valley Trust for 26 years and said he was concerned about lambs that had been on the hills all winter. He said, “There’s not many of them that’ll say they’ve seen a fire like this, on this side of the Claerwen Dam.”

He also said, “It’s not a nice thing to have about, because it’s so vast.” He said he would not know the financial impact until the fire has been put out, and he did not know how much money he lost last year.

For now, the practical message is simple: stay away from the area, follow the closure at Hafod Estate and keep homes closed if smoke thickens. The fire crews are still working across the reservoir country, and the people who live and work there are left waiting for the flames to ease enough to see what is left behind.