Renown depot blaze destroys buses

Staff at Renown Coaches worked through the night to re-arrange schedules and prepare alternative vehicles for use today.

Renown's Wainwright Road depot is within sight of the rear of the police station and has been the subject of previous arson attack. It is directly opposite the site of the April blaze which destroyed thousands of new Rother council wheelie bins being stored on the car park. This arson attack also destroyed the adjoining headquarters of the 9th Bexhill Scout Group.

One of the Renown yard's boundaries fronts Wainwright Road, another the public footpath from which a previous arson attack on its buses is believed to have been launched.

The single-deck buses destroyed last night were parked in the centre of the locked compound and it is believed the attacker broke in to start the blaze.

At the scene early this morning Renown traffic manager Dave Smith told the Observer: "I got a phone call about 10.30pm or 10.40.

"We have lost three buses totally destroyed. Those that surrounded them have suffered superficial damage."

Asked the estimated cost of the fire, he said: "It is not the cost of replacement it is the cost of maintaining our services and the number of people it affects."

The fire-damaged buses were in daily use under a county social services contract to take special needs children to school. Mr Smith said the buses were used on school runs as far afield as Crowborough.

"We shall maintain our social services runs today but through no small effort. We have worked through the night to get everything together. We have probably sacrificed some of our own commercial operation at Eastbourne to do it.

"We don't know how the fire was started yet. Police are still doing their investigation so it is difficult to say."