This is the moment the fire brigade rescued a charity duck race – by BLASTING the yellow toys down a stagnant river with their hosepipes.
The charity event was meant to see more than 600 rubber ducks race down 100 yards of the River Avon in Malmesbury, Wilts.
But the hot summer has left water levels so low that the current was not strong enough to carry the toys downstream.
So organiser Julie Exton called the local fire brigade – who waded into the water and spent an HOUR hosing the ducks towards the finish line.
Julie said: “It took ages for the ducks to move, at one point they were just going backwards.
“The firefighters used it as a training session but it still took an hour for the last duck to come in. It was still a lovely afternoon.”
The event aimed to raise money for a local football club, whose ground was severely damaged when the river flooded last year.
“We thought that as the river was what had damaged the football pitches that’s what we’d use to fundraise,” said Julie.
Chris Harvey, watch manager for Malmesbury fire station, said: “We got a call from the organisers a couple of days before the event saying that they were worried about how calm the river was.
“It’s an event that we’ve helped out with in the past so we used it as an opportunity to get all of our water rescue kit out and treat it like a training session.
“We were at the event for about an hour, helping the plastic ducks down the river.”