Arthur's Seat fire: Crew expected to remain at site of Edinburgh's Arthur's Seat fire 'for a couple of days'

Fire crews are expected to remain at the site blaze in Holyrood Park in Edinburgh “for a couple of days”, the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has said.

Firefighters worked overnight and are continuing to tackle a grass fire that broke out on Salisbury Crags near Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh on Sunday evening.

Firefighters worked through the night to battle a blaze at Salisbury Crags in Edinburgh | Neil Pooran/PA Wire

The first reports were received at around 6.30pm on Sunday evening, with four appliances initially sent to the scene.

However, the fire escalated overnight, spreading further around the hill. As of 7.30am on Monday, six appliances are on-site tackling the blaze.

Speaking to BBC Radio Scotland on Monday morning, assistant chief officer John Henderson of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said: “The fire on Arthur’s Seat, at the minute, is about 0.01 kilometres squared.

“Protracted wildfire incidents, they’re weather-driven, we deal with them in partnership, they take a protracted period of time to deal with them.

“We tend to be there for protracted periods of time, even after the fire is extinguished to make sure that we’re maintaining the hotspots.”

He continued: “The feeling from the ground there is that we’ll probably be there for a couple of days, continuing to tackle that and dampen out hotspots from those.”

He said the cause of the fire is not yet known, with crews focused on containing and extinguishing the blazes before an investigation can be carried out.

While he accepted “sometimes these things happen”, the fire officer urged residents to take precautions when outdoors in hot weather.

“In any of the areas where we’ve got wildfire warnings, or as I said on Arthur’s Seat, we don’t advocate any open flames.

“So, no sources that could start a spark – so no use of barbecues, no open fires, nothing along those lines, and really tidy up after yourself.”