The huge stable fire in Sint Oedenrode with 9000 dead piglets and adult pigs is no incident. In recent years, it has happened about twice a year in our province. An overview of the largest barn fires.
2022 – Vinkel (700 goats)
At the end of November, a fire broke out in a goat shed with 700 animals on a farm on the Weerschut in Vinkel. The fire started in the part where the hay and feed was stored. Most of the goats died instantly and the few that managed to escape later succumbed to their injuries and stress.
2022 – Heusden, municipality of Asten (43,000 chickens)
In the village of Heusden, things go completely wrong at a poultry farm at the end of April. Two chicken houses go up in flames and 43,000 of the total of 63,000 chickens die. The fire brigade barely manages to prevent three other stables and the farm next to them from catching fire.
2020 – Sterksel (450 pigs)
In a major fire in a pigsty on the Vlaamseweg in Sterksel, the fire brigade manages to save 600 pigs. For 400 animals in the rear part of the barn, help comes too late because they are suffocating. A lightning strike is believed to have caused the fire.
2020 – Lierop (1000 pigs)
About a thousand pigs did not survive when a fire broke out in their stable in Lierop. According to the affected pig farmer, the animals probably suffocated in their sleep after the extraction system stopped working due to a power failure. After the fire, security guards were in the yard to prevent angry activists from entering.
2019 – Asten (500 piglets)
A stable of twenty by fifty meters burned out completely within an hour. The fire quickly spread through the ventilation ducts of the air-wash system. The piglets that died were not intended for slaughter, they would later be used as breeding pigs.
2019 – Rush mortar (3000 pigs)
Three of the four stables on a farm in Biezenmortel were completely destroyed. The fire moved very quickly through the air scrubber. Those tubes are intended to clean the air full of ammonia and other pollutants, but those scrubbers also fan the fire in the event of a fire.
Shortly after the fire, the farm was defaced by animal activists with the text ‘burn in hell’. To prevent further threats, a temporary neighborhood watch was even set up to guard the farm day and night.
2018 – Asten-Heusden (4000 pigs)
The fire at the Pannenhoef for a lot of anger and sadness. Especially since 26,000 chickens died earlier that year in Willemstad. Incidentally, it could have turned out much worse. 4,000 pigs and 800 piglets from two adjacent stables could still be saved in time.
2016 – Oirschot (10,700 pigs)
The most devastating barn fire in recent years was at the Notel in Oirschot. Nearly 11,000 pigs died in the blaze, which was accompanied by explosions and which also released asbestos. The owner of the company was welding when the fire started. He was unable to put out the fire himself. His company had just been declared bankrupt and a restart was close at the time of the fire.
Research by the Association of Insurers showed that there were 67 stable fires in Brabant between 2014 and 2021. That was 1 in 5 in the whole of the Netherlands.
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