Police told drivers to leave their cars ‘if you want to stay alive’ as a van fire sparked a wildfire by a dual carriageway this afternoon.
Traffic came to a halt and drivers were ordered to the side of the road after flames from the van ignited ‘tinderbox bracken’ by the westbound A31 near the New Forest in Hampshire.
A policewoman told drivers to get out of their cars and move to the central reservation next to the road ‘if you want to stay alive’.
Later a firefighter was overheard telling a police officer: ‘We want all the cars and people off the carriageway. Unattended cars are basically bombs when they go off.’
A fire officer at the scene said: ‘We believe it was a van that caught fire on the road and that set alight to the shrubs at the side of the road.’
The van driver is believed to have escaped.
Another fire officer said the blaze was out of control and would not be tamed until at least tomorrow.
Hundreds of drivers remained stuck by the spreading fire while crews worked out how to evacuate them from the area.
Drivers were ordered to leave their cars ‘if you want to stay alive’ on the A31 in Hampshire this afternoon
A policewoman was filmed directing drivers to the central reservation after a van fire spread to the vegetation by the westbound carriageway near the New Forest
A fire officer said the fire was out of control and would not be tamed until tomorrow
Motorists told how flames spread across both sides of the dual carriageway about a mile from the Canadian War Memorial just north-east of Shobley.
One driver said: ‘It happened so fast. Some drivers just went straight through the flames. Others did emergency stops, turned around and tried to get back along the carriageway. It was sheer panic.’
Libbi Aldred, 36, said she had been driving on the dual carriageway when around ten cars in front of her began slowing down and putting their hazards on.
She said there was a fire ‘in the middle’ of the road and there was ‘smoke’ and ‘billowing’ flames.
Ms Aldred, a dog trainer from Hightown, Hampshire, said another driver – a grandfather who had his grandchildren with him – saw two cars in front of him go through the blaze but that ‘the flames were hitting’ their cars.
Smoke billowed from the trees next to the road on Sunday afternoon as motorists abandoned their cars
Hundreds of drivers lined the dual carriageway as police worked out how to evacuate them
The fire spread across the ‘tinderbox bracken’ next to the motorway after a 30C day in Hampshire
He and other drivers turned around and began to head for the previous exit but Ms Aldred said police told them to stay in their cars.
‘We didn’t take that advice,’ she said, because ‘the flames started coming towards us’.
As the fire spread, police arrived and ordered drivers out of their cars before fire engines were filmed racing towards the blaze.
Ms Aldred said the fire spread quickly and the wind carried it into the vegetation next to the road.
Temperatures in Hampshire rose above 30C today as motorists gathered in the shade next to the road.
Some were filmed kicking a football on the tarmac as the police were unable to say when they would be able to leave.
Hampshire police and the county’s fire service were contacted for comment.
