Fire crews from across the north-east were called out to deal with a wildfire at a farm yesterday.
Around 100 firefighters battled the blaze for more than five hours at Lochbuy Farm, at Peathill near Rosehearty, to bring it under control.
Emergency services rushed to the scene shortly before 12.40pm when calls came in from concerned members of the public.
They arrived to find three large sections of fire – the largest was estimated to be about 500 metres long.
The farmer was assisting crews by helping to create fire breaks in the gorse to stop it spreading to other areas on the land.
Thick white smoke could be seen billowing over Peathill and other properties in the area but no one needed to be evacuated from their homes.
Crews were still working at the site during the evening.
A spokeswoman for the fire service said: “The fire is quite out in the open and there’s quite a large area involved.
“We got the first call at 12.38pm and have many firefighters on scene.
“Two appliances were sent from Fraserburgh, one from Peterhead, Maud, Turriff, Macduff, Huntly and three from Aberdeen.
“It seems to have started as a controlled burning that’s now out of control.
“The teams have spread across three different sections, all of which are a considerable size.”
Ambulance crews were also sent out to the farm as a precaution in case anyone was injured.
And police closed off access roads to prevent members of the public coming too close to the blaze as firefighters worked at the scene.
A police spokesman said: “Initially there was a controlled burning that got out of control somehow. The call first came into us at 12.38pm from a local resident.
“We also got reports from the fire crews about the incident. Our role was mainly assisting them where we could.”
The incident was the latest of a series of wildfires which have broken out across the north of Scotland during dry weather conditions in recent weeks.
On Friday an area of woodland ignited on Kylesmorar where firefighters had to wait for an RNLI lifeboat to be launched from Mallaig to get access to the scene.
At nearby Morar, three crews were tasked with tackling an area of heath spanning around 50 acres. Crews battled to bring the fire front down with beaters, reducing it to 100 metres, before a hose reel jet was used.
Emergency crews were also sent to tackle wildfires in the north-east area earlier this month.
Crews spent about 17 hours putting out a fire on the Paul’s Hill Wind Farm on the Ballindalloch Estate near Aberlour.
A fire also erupted at the Scotstown Nature Reserve in Aberdeen on Thursday as flames crept within 150ft of homes.
