Firefighters tackle wildfires visible for miles across Welsh countryside

The Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service said they sent three crews from Morriston, Pontardawe and Neath to help extinguish the blaze.

A spokesperson said firefighters responded to the scene at 7.09pm on Tuesday evening using blowers and beaters to tackle the fire which was put out at 11.12pm.

Video footage filmed in Morriston near Swansea shows flames and smoke from the mountain visible from many miles away.

Claire Kempster, from Craig-cefn-parc, above Clydach, said there had been wildfires in the area for the last week.

“It happened last year too. They do land management on the gorse bushes. Sometimes it’s the farmers clearing the gorse bushes, and sometimes it’s an accident,” she told the PA news agency.

Last week her husband called the fire brigade as a fire came near to their house.

“There’s about four houses above us in a row, and it came right up to their boundary, so that was probably about 300 metres from our house,” she said.

“We saw it and went out to it, and it was my husband that called fire engines. They had it out really quickly.”

Elsewhere across the country, firefighters tackled a large grass fire in Ferndale and Maerdy mountain in south Wales and others in Caerphilly, Ogmore Vale, Gelli Pentre and Fairwood Common Swansea.

A spokeswoman for South Wales Fire and Rescue Service said “it was pretty non-stop”.

North Wales Fire and Rescue Service also said it had dealt with gorse fire on Tuesday night, including a large one at Garreg Fawr in Llanfairfechan, which was left to burn out.