Palace Barracks blaze destroys UDR veterans' aid headquarters

A fire on Wednesday morning at the military base in Holywood, on the eastern outskirts of Belfast, destroyed a building housing both the regimental headquarters of the Royal Irish Regiment and the offices of a group called the UDR and R Irish Aftercare Service.

This latter organisation was set up after Operation Banner ended a decade ago to help veterans of the regiments obtain things like physiotherapy or counselling, or offer advice or financial support.

Director Peter Baillie said he came to work at around 8am to find fire crews tackling the blaze in the two-floor red-brick building.

“Smoke was spotted coming out of the building early in the morning,” he said.

“As people came in to work they were able to see the flames advancing.

“There was a big wind, and you could see the roof being eaten away.”

He added: “It caught hold of the first floor ... it weakened the whole structure of the building and that plus I presume the weight of the water caused the ceilings to collapse internally, which led to damage to the ground floor.”

The regimental headquarters was upstairs, and the aftercare group below it.

About eight staff are based in each, he said, but there was no-one in the building at the time. He believes the blaze may have been electrical in nature.

In all, 35 firefighters tackled the fire after receiving a call at 7.13am.

Seven fire vehicles were sent to the scene, and the incident was declared over at 12.32pm.

The fire brigade believes the blaze was accidental.

Major Colin Gray, regimental secretary for the Royal Irish Regiment. told Forces Radio BFBS that some valuable pieces of memorabilia were saved – including two statuettes and a cigar box.

He said: “We are very lucky that the fire started at one end of the building ... the end of the building that had less of our valuable artefacts and history in it.

“The other end of the building where the really valuable regimental memorabilia is isn’t quite as badly damaged.”

Mr Baillie said both the aftercare service and regimental headquarters are “back in business” already elsewhere in the barracks, and that the former organisation has its “flag flying”.

The aftercare service has five offiices and about 18 staff in Northern Ireland, and since it was set up, Mr Baillie said it has assisted between 15,000 and 20,000 individuals.

In all, he estimated the total number of veterans eligible for its help may be 63,000.

He said there is a temporary number set up for the aftercare service: 02890 420266. It can also be reached by email at [email protected].

MI5 also uses the Palace Barracks site, but the Home Office divulged no information about whether its work has been impacted by the fire.