Over three hundred people received medical treatment
yesterday following the explosion and fire which put an abrupt end to The
Greening festival on Froghill Common.
The day started ordinarily enough, with record numbers
flocking to enjoy the annual May bank holiday celebration. After a display by a troupe
of Morris 1100 dancers and music by Hillman and the Imps, the crowd fell to enjoying
such traditional pastimes as Bugger the Weasel, Nine Men’s Nob, Shout at the Pig
and Arse Roistering.
It was during the Slug and Acorn Slingshot event
that things took a turn for the worse. Having previously stretched their slugs to
the regulation two feet in length, contestants staked them into the turf and then
began firing acorns at the wicker man target.
Not all of the acorns found that target however, with
one in particular ricocheting off the backside of a nearby Cocker Spaniel. Yelping
in protest, the aggrieved animal broke away from its owner and disappeared into the marquee,
where it delivered resident jester, Guillaume the Simple, a bite on the leg.
A shocked Guillaume, standing among the spectators at the Rabbit Shaving competition, dropped his bladder. It burst with a resounding
bang, releasing the two thousand Celastrina
butterflies which had been stored inside for the closing ceremony.
Startled by the detonation, 2018 champion
shaver Derek Moore missed his stroke, accidentally decapitating his neighbour’s
rabbit. Last year’s runner-up Clive Cook then retaliated in kind, lunging with his
clippers in a vicious counter attack.
This proved too much for Moore, who aimed a fist at
Cook’s nose.
The region’s two finest shavers then launched
themselves at each other, tumbling to the ground and rolling off into the
crowd. Latent animosity flared as two sets of supporters began throwing
drinks and trading punches. As the air turned blue with butterflies and
swearing, the marquee erupted in a frenzy of long-suppressed rabbit rivalry.
“I was just trying to interest a customer in some
alternative puddings, seeing as how we’d run out of Duck Membrane Roulade,”
said 46-year-old Ian Willoughby, a volunteer in the Traditional Fayre food tent,
“when suddenly there’s all these butterflies flying about and the noise of people
shouting and brawling.
“I looked outside at the marquee and it was swaying dangerously.”
No sooner had he popped his head back inside than
the marquee pulled its guy ropes and slowly toppled sideways.
The seething mass of canvas landed directly on the
food tent, overturning a rack of propane gas bottles in the process. An unguarded hob
ensured that the subsequent explosion catapulted festival-goers high into the
air and shattered windows in houses as far away as Swansdike.
Emergency services were called and arrived on the
scene within minutes. Two fire engines brought the blaze under control while a dozen
ambulances ferried the injured to hospital.
Mr Willoughby, who was thrown clear by the blast, woke
to find himself entangled in a hawthorn bush, suffering from second-degree
burns and Ragwort Stew impregnation.
“I was lucky that bush broke my fall” said the heavily
bandaged father of two, speaking to the Observer
from his bed in the Festive Burns Unit at Froghill General. “Otherwise, it could
have been a lot worse.
“You know, at the end of the day, I never did find out
whether that customer fancied my Spotted Dick,” he added.
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