What resources are needed to fight a major fire started by a chinese lantern?

The Midlands area experienced the worst fire for decades recently when a celebration Chinese Lantern drifted over the wall of a plastic recycling yard in Smethwick, settled on the plastic and proceeded to burn out before setting alight to the plastic beneath it. The plume of smoke from the resulting fire could be seen from my house, 16 miles away, and was high enough to cause flights into Birmingham Airport to be diverted around the airport.

West Midlands Fire Service have now put together a video which records how the event unfolded and we think it is well worth a watch. We would embed it, but West Midlands Fire Service have stopped that from being possible, so just visit this link to watch.

The owners of the recycling yard could have done nothing to prevent the fire, but the person, or persons, who lit the lantern and set it free could have prevented it by just asking themselves "What if?"

What if this lands on a timber house with people asleep inside?

What if this lands on some waste oil spilled earlier by someone else who forgot to say What if?

I am not calling for a ban on Chinese lanterns, as some people are, but I am asking for people to do the risk assessment before they set it free. A lit lantern launched from a clifftop and blown out to sea is far less a hazard than the same lantern launched in a built up area, because remember "What goes up must come down" and when it does it could have devastating effects.