A chance encounter . . .

. . . with a firefighting cart.

Walking through the village this morning, we came across this vehicle being pulled out of the shed where it is kept. We soon realised it was some sort of photoshoot . I haven’t found out why this was happening yet but, as I know all the people involved, I didn’t think they would mind me joining in with the photography.

Apparently a cart like this was given to every village during the Second World War and somehow our village managed to keep theirs. Their reason for hanging on to it was that it would act as a fast and effective first response unit for fighting fires in the first instance, as the roads round here can get quite tricky in the winter, so it can be a while before the fire engines arrive. It has been used for just that purpose on several occasions over the years. Here’s the report of one such event.

The cart is kept in the shed opposite the workplace of the wooden rake makers. I blipped this a while back. In fact two of the firemen are the father and son who have the business.