A Herefordshire farm has been rapped for putting people at risk of drowning in its slurry lagoon.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) served two improvement notices individually on Nigel and Sally Green of Much Fawley Farm, a mixed poultry farm near the river Wye between Ross-on-Wye and Hereford.
These said that “unauthorised access to the perimeter of your slurry lagoon is not adequately prevented which poses a risk of drowning”.
The Health and Safety Executive gave the couple until today (Friday, March 22) to comply with the notice. It is now shown as complied with.
Last summer the HSE served immediate prohibition notices on the Greens over their two anaerobic digesters at the farm. Both of these anaerobic digesters were were found to be leaking gas among other failings.
The Environment Agency earlier issued an “enforcement undertaking” against the farm for discharging waste water from the farm without permission, “resulting [in] pollution of the river Wye” in April 2021.
A recent freedom of information request shows further investigations were made over water pollution claims at the farm in 2022 and twice more in 2023.
Aerial images of the farm shows it is around 200 metres from the river Wye and rated by Natural England as being in “unfavourable-declining” environmental condition.