It happened twice in one week. Stately farms with thatched roofs disappeared like snow in the sun. Both times due to the suffocating heat of a sea of fire. One in Witten, the other in Winde. The thatched roof is indicated as the cause, but that remains to be seen.
The day after the fire, only rubble remains of both farms. The fire brigade tried with all their might to fight the fire, but that turned out to be no easy task because of the covering on the roof. “A thatched roof is extremely difficult to extinguish,” says Linda van der Heide, spokesperson for the Drenthe Safety Region.
Reed decker Doede ter Veld substantiates this. “A thatched roof is covered on the outside with numerous protective layers, which ensure that water slides off the roof as easily as possible. This makes it difficult to extinguish when such a thatched roof has caught fire.”
In addition, it does not become easier when oxygen is added, and that is precisely the case with a thatched roof. “It is footwear with fuel in it. That makes it very difficult to extinguish the moment a spark appears,” says Van der Heide.