Hundreds of homes in darkness as crews tackle fire

Part of a Dorset village was plunged into darkness as crews tackled a fire in a nearby industrial unit.

Firefighters spent the night tackling the blaze on the outskirts of Shillingstone where the alarm was raised at 18:00 GMT on Thursday.

The electricity had to be isolated, leaving hundreds of homes without power for more than three hours.

One fire engine remained on the scene on Friday morning, with the crew damping down hotspots.

Dorset and Wiltshire Fire and Rescue said, at the height of the incident, there were crews from six stations, six fire engines and a water carrier at the scene.

The fire service said Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) had restored power by 22:00, and by midnight the incident had been scaled back to three appliances.

A spokesperson for SSEN said: "At the request of the fire service, Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks isolated supplies to around 460 customers in the Shillingstone area following a fire in a barn last night at around quarter to seven.

"Supplies were restored to residents who were not directly affected by this fire around three hours later. We’d like to thank people in the area for their patience and understanding while we supported the fire service’s response to this incident."

You can follow BBC Dorset on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.