A DEVASTATING fire which ripped through a builder’s yard caused up to £100,000 worth of damage.

Thirty firefighters fought the blaze in Milton Abbas which could be seen from miles away as it engulfed a joinery workshop on the site.

Nearby houses lost their electricity supply and telephone connection after overhead cables were damaged by the inferno on Friday night.

Police were at the scene but it is believed the cause was accidental – possibly from a stray spark from a bonfire.

Site owner John Felstead had been running both J.M Felstead builders and Milton Joinery from the yard for more than 40 years. The joinery building was burnt to the ground.

The 65-year-old said: “I’m absolutely devastated, everything is gone.

“It was the most equipped workshop in Dorset – I still can’t believe this has happened. My wife and I were asleep in bed when we were woken up by the police at our front door at 1.30am.”

Mr Felstead, of Winterborne Stickland, added: “I went up there straight away and from miles off I could see the light in the sky from the flames.

“But when I got there it was too late, there was nothing anyone could do.

“I just can’t get my head around the figures, it must be between £75,000 and £100,000, there was all the equipment, raw materials and finished projects and now it’s literally all gone up in smoke.

“At the moment I don’t know if I would want to rebuild the joinery business but I will definitely carry on with the building company.”

Mr Felstead employs eight full-time staff as well as contractors and part-time employees.

He said “I’ve got to take stock and figure out what’s gone. I had insurance for all work that was carried out, which I think will cover the contents, but I couldn’t get insurance for the building itself because it had been broken into so many times.”

Four fire crews and other support units from the area were alerted at 11.10pm and battled for hours to get the blaze under control.

Firefighters had to pull back and fight the flames from a safe distance because of the intensity of the blaze and the danger of propane gas leaking from overheated cylinders on the site.

Ashley Errington, who lives nearby, said: “The fire was huge; the flames were as high as the trees and looked very intense.”

Two crews stayed on the scene throughout the night. Dorset Fire and Rescue Service said the blaze involved a single storey building made of timber and corrugated iron, some vehicles, a diesel tank and propane gas cylinders.

A spokesman said the believed cause of the fire was an unattended bonfire.

Power out to nearby homes

A SOUTHERN Electric spokesman said: “We were notified by the fire brigade at 12.15am of an incident in Milton Abbas and an engineer was on the site an hour later.

“The fire had damaged the overhead lines which blew the transformer out, cutting power to the neighbouring houses.

“We found a pole-mounted transformer was damaged and four properties were affected.”

He added: “We were unable to restore power that night and we went back out in the morning to fit a new transformer.

“To do this we had to put another four houses off for a couple of hours.

“Power was restored just after midday on Saturday.”