House fire
Emergency crews were called to a fire at a house on Pottingfield Road in Rye on Friday, June 6. East Sussex Fire and Rescue received news of the fire at 4.32pm, with three fire engines attending from The Ridge, Bohemia Road and Battle.
Crews used breathing apparatus, one hose reel jet and an aerial ladder platform to extinguish the fire. UK Power Networks were also in attendance. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
Power cut
UK Power Networks are also investigating after a number of power cuts on Saturday, June 7 which affected much of Rye. Whilst most homes were quickly connected, some faced lengthier cuts.
A spokesperson for the company apologized for the inconvenience. “The outage was caused by a high voltage overhead line fault. Unexpected contact with lines can cause this to happen. Overhead line routes can span long distances meaning it can take time to trace and repair a fault, so our team diverted power. We’ll continue to monitor the local network.”
Meet the police
There’s a community meeting with Sussex Police this Sunday, June 15 in the Cattle Market car park in Rye. Officers will be available between 3 and 4pm.
A spokesperson said the team looked forward to meeting local people. “If you live or work in Rye town, please come along and meet your local Neighbourhood Officers. This is a great opportunity to share your concerns, discuss local issues, and help shape how resources are allocated to best support our community.”
The impact of council land sales on social housing
Asset disposals by Rother District and East Sussex County Councils came up as a cause for concern during the Planning and Townscape meeting of Rye Town Council on Monday, June 9.
Cllr. Boyd pointed out that plans to have a Rye Community Land Trust (CLT) focussed on social housing may be impacted if land price becomes prohibitive. It was observed that recent announcements by ESCC on the potential “commercial” sale of land at Tilling Green and the Freda Gardham old school site could make it more difficult to fund social housing projects via a CLT.
The meeting also heard fears that selling off council assets to help fill budget gaps is being encouraged in new national planning guidelines, which are now under development by central government.
Other initiatives being discussed include faster planning cycles supported by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and a less restrictive approach to nature recovery in development plans. Local communities will continue to have a scrutinising role, the meeting heard, but development should not unnecessarily be obstructed.
Dutch school group say “hoera” to their time in Rye
The u3a Wednesday Boules Group were happy to help out a visiting Dutch school group, who were looking for a photo opportunity last week. Part of their activities while in Rye, was to create, and photograph, an interesting situation with local people.
The u3a boules groups meet on the Strand each Tuesday and Wednesday and often attract attention from visitors. Most visitors are just curious, as to what the game is, but the French are quite surprised to see us Brits playing ‘their’ game.
This weekend
It’s one of the highlights of the Rye year – the Senlac Classic Car Show at Rye Ruby club – takes place this Sunday, June 15 10am-5pm.
The show, organised by the Rotary Club of Senlac St Leonards is celebrating its 30th anniversary. A real highlight will see two Spitfires from the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight making a flypast at 12.35pm (subject to aircraft serviceability and weather conditions).
Looking ahead
Image Credits: James Stewart , Pontificalibus https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UK_Power_Networks_diesel-powered_temporary_generator.jpg cc http://as%20above, Sussex Police , Kt bruce , Ian Scott , Nick Forman .
How long does it take for a fire engine to get to Rye from The Ridge, Bohemia Road and Battle, and how much can get destroyed in those very long minutes? It must be utter hell for homeowners and residents.
Andrew certainly has a good point,it’s the same with the other emergency services racing to incidents each day in Rye, surely with the huge catchment area we have its time to get these services stationed back in Rye,for the safety of all, 24/7.
Presumably Broad Oak would be the nearest fire station? It does seem strange that Rye has no such facility, particularly when there are so many old buildings in close proximity to one another……
Wow!!
Anyone who is not familiar with Rye will get the impression that there isn’t a fire station in Rye, in fact we have an excellent fire station and crew as most of you will know.
Why wasn’t the Rye machine at the fire?
There could be many reasons, maybe they were already at another fire, maybe they had mechanical problems or maybe they just didn’t have a crew.
There will be those that say that they shouldn’t have got rid of the second pump, you might be right but ask how often the second was unmanned in any week and I think you’ll be surprised.