Fire puts 200 jobs in peril

FIRE-struck St Merryn Meat may have to pull out of Falmouth if their Bickland Water site is too badly damaged from last Tuesday’s blaze.

Between 150 and 200 local jobs could be threatened.

“It’s possible. we may have to move. We are gathering information,” company secretary Ian Woods told the Packet this week.

He said: “It’s all about getting back to full production. The insurance company don’t want to support us for 18 months - which they could be. We must have full capacity for the kind of products made at the Falmouth factory, particularly before Christmas. And Christmas for us starts in September.”

He later said he thought rebuilding at the Bickland Water estate site “likely”.

He added: "If the quickest way is to rebuild on the Falmouth site, then that will happen." Going without production for a single week was too long. At the moment the firm was only producing 65 to 75 per cent of its previous output of the mainly minced meat packs which the Falmouth factory supplied to Tesco.

Woman, 81, trapped in car after Penryn 'bypass' blunder

An elderly woman was trapped in her car for more than nine hours overnight after she mistook a supermarket access road for the Penryn by-pass.

Mrs Evelyn Brickell, of Porthleven, suffered a fractured arm, but luckily for her she had blankets and a woolly hat in the ca, which meant she was able to keep herself reasonably warm throughout her ordeal.

Pc Andy Huddlestone explained that Mrs Brickell had been trapped in her car since about 9pm the previous evening after she apparently mistook the slip-road for the access to the nearby Penryn by-pass.

It is thought she had driven up towards Leos and, after reaching the top of the road and realising her mistake, was attempting to manoeuvre her car so she could drive back down to the roundabout.

It would appear that while turning the car, Mrs Brickell accidentally put her foot on the accelerator and the Fiesta shot over an embankment before coming to rest.

Hospital on target for summer

Falmouth should get its community hospital in the summer of 1998. It will also include a small casualty unit, possibly open 24 hours a day seven days a week.

The site of the new hospital could be either at Budock Hospital or the present site of Falmouth hospital or a third, as yet unknown, site.

Whatever site is chosen, surplus sites will be sold off.