Farmer's livelihood devastated by blaze that tore through bird shed killing up to 13,000 hens

A free-range egg farmer has told how his livelihood has been devastated by a blaze that tore through his bird shed, killing up to 13,000 hens.

David Hugill, is well known around Teesside as the man who sells eggs at markets in North Ormesby, Redcar and Darlington and as a member of Hambleton District Council and North York Moors National Park Authority,

In the early hours of yesterday morning, David was woken by the sound of a huge fire which had completely engulfed his 90m-long £600,000 shed chicken shed at Faceby, near Stokesley,

David said: “I was awoken in the night with a massive crackling.

“The shed is only 30 or 40 yards away from the house.

“It could’ve been much worse, in between the shed and the house is another shed which had four dogs and two horses inside.

“I’d managed to get them out but it was such a strong wind that it burnt everything.”

Scene of a fire at Turtle Hill Farm, Faceby

Crews from both Cleveland and North Yorkshire brigades were called to the Hugills’ farm just off Millfield House track near Faceby. Firefighters initially dispatched two fire engines to the scene at 1.20am but following a large number of calls this was upscaled

At its height, six units from Stokesley, Northallerton, Coulby Newham, Yarm and Middlesbrough were on the scene fighting the fire and preventing it from spreading to nearby buildings.

Sadly, by the time firefighters had left the scene at 9am, the shed had been completely destroyed.

About 13,000 chickens were in the outbuilding at the time and all were killed in the fire.

“Someone’s just been round to look at the damage. The damage to the shed is 100%,” said David.

“It’s such a total blaze there’s nothing left - it’s virtually impossible to work out how it started.

“The fire brigade are ruling out foul play. We have CCTV and there’s nothing to suggest anyone has started it deliberately.

“However it’s started, within an hour it’s completely gone up.”

Scene of a fire at Turtle Hill Farm, Faceby

Having examined the CCTV, North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service currently believe the cause of the fire to have been accidental.

“The big problem really is that the hens were at peak-production. They were producing a nice big egg when this happened.

“But we still have eggs in stock so it won’t affect our market day trading.

“We’ve got to clear up the debris and order new birds but it’s not going to affect our market business,

“I always start work with the birds at 5am - today I woke up with nothing to do.

“That’s the most frustrating part of the whole thing.”