Rain 'takes away fire concerns' for steam rally

2 hours ago

Chloe Hughesand

Mark Elliott,in Shrewsbury

News image — Rob Ball says the rain has helped organisers with their preparations

BBC A man with white hair is wearing a black T-shirt and orange hi-vis jacket with silver reflective strips. He is standing next to a black steam engine which has a tall funnel and has a blue cover on it. On its front it says "Fowler, Leeds" — Rob Ball says the rain has helped organisers with their preparations

An organiser of a Shropshire festival that will exhibit hundreds of steam vehicles says recent rain has "taken away all our concern about fire risk".

Shrewsbury Steam Rally is in its 65th year and takes place on Sunday and bank holiday Monday at Onslow Park, in Bicton Heath.

Earlier in the month, the festival, which is expecting about 16,000 visitors over the two days, announced a complete ban on barbecues and fires due to the high risk of fires following weeks of hot, dry weather.

The ban remains in place, but treasurer Rob Ball said the rain had helped reduce the risk.

"That [fire] was a potential hazard but we've done our risk assessments... obviously the rain's kind of helped us really," he told BBC Radio Shropshire.

"The ground's holding up, we've not had a lot of rain for a long time, so at the moment everything's going to plan."

He added there were also measures in place to protect the vehicles from rain.

"We tend to sheet them up really, just to make the cleaning a bit easier and obviously keep the water off if we can," he said.

The event is due to have about 100 vintage tractors on its working field, more than 110 steam engines, as well as cars and motorbikes, vintage fairground rides, food and stalls.

Ian Forsyth/Getty Images A black steam engine with gold accents and a red sign on the side which reads "Dalton Boy". It has a long funnel on it and is lined up with other engines in the background, pumping steam out of their funnels — Hundreds of vintage and steam vehicles similar to these will be at the event

The complete ban on barbecues and fires at the event was announced on 19 August.

It followed a number of fires across the country caused by disposable barbecues - including in Cannock Chase and Sandyford, Staffordshire, as well as further afield in the North York Moors National Park and Grace Dieu Woods, in Leicestershire.

It also follows a temporary ban on selling disposable barbecues by the government.

Traffic measures added

Another change made this year is to traffic and access management systems, after last year saw people sitting in long queues to get in and out of the event, according to its website.

"While Sunday's gridlock was heavily compounded by a police road closure following a road traffic accident a few miles away, we recognise that our own car park systems then struggled to handle the volume of vehicles once that external backlog cleared," the event's website said of the 2025 rally.

Organisers said they had made a "significant financial investment" to overhaul its traffic management and hire a separate traffic management company.

This year, one team will focus on the roads approaching Onslow Park while another will be dedicated specifically to parking, as well as ensuring vehicles are fed back out on to roads and preventing bottlenecks at the end of each day.

The grounds will open at 08:30 BST for people with early access tickets, before general admission begins at 09:00.