Turbine at 60 MW offshore wind project in the North Sea catches fire

RWE’s Scroby 60 MW Sands wind farm, one of the UK’s earliest offshore parks, caught fire. A wind turbine in the North Sea was the source of the fire, but all staff members were safely evacuated. The wind farm is located on a sandbank off the town of Great Yarmouth in England. It has 30 turbines and was commissioned in 2004.

The turbine at Scroby Sands is no longer on fire, and there was no need to deploy search and rescue services. The fire broke out in the turbine nacelle. The Coastguard was monitoring the area and advising on a potential 500-meter (1,640-ft) exclusion zone. While wind turbines catching fire is not unheard of, a number of similar incidents have been reported in recent years.

The UK is a significant player in offshore wind, with a number of large-scale projects, such as the fully operational Hornsea 2 and the under-construction Dogger Bank Wind Farm. While the fire is a setback for the Scroby Sands project, it is expected to have little impact on the UK's offshore wind industry as a whole.