31/10/2016 Inside Out South West

The devastating blaze that ripped through the heart of historhc

Exeter. Tonight, questions over how the fire spread and the futtre for

those affected. Cut it is the word because not only is the building

gutted, but that is how I fdel. It went from building to buildhng to

building. Aiden Turner as you have never seen him before. We mdet the

Cornish artists recreating the brusque rogues of Vincent v`n Gogh

for the big screen. I feel like I am turning into van Gogh. I am Jemma

Woodman and welcome to Inside Out South West.

300 years of history reduced to ash and rubble. The Royal Clarence

considered England's oldest hotel but it's lost now, leaving ` gaping

hole in the heart of Exeter's medieval centre. Tonight we ask why

did the blaze spread in such a devastating way and what now for the

future of this ancient part of the city? Harriet Bradshaw was the first

reporter on the scene and now has the full story. God! Word is

burning. Incredible. That is near the cathedral, look at this.

A major blaze has taken hold out a art gallery near cathedral green.

Police and six by engines are at the scene. The flames have incrdased.

The orange glow is reaching the top. In the early hours of Fridax this

happened ? just a few hundrdd I was woken up first thing by a

shrill alarm echoing out of cathedral green. I turned a corner

and my legs went to jelly. H could not believe what I was ceilhng. The

building, flames coming out of the windows, smoke out of the rooftop.

The fire broke out in a building under development on the cathedral

the Royal Clarence Hotel. Hd took the Royal Clarence Hotel. Hd took

these pictures. What woke md was the raging sound of fire and thd

brightness of Orange in the room. As I leapt out of bed I could see our

window was full of orange flame I grabbed my partner from the bed and

said, there's a fire, get ott. Everyone in the hotel escapdd

safely. I opened the door and saw this huge smoke and ash comhng from

the building. I saw bright orange flames. We all rushed out and we

immediately realised becausd as we came out, there was falling debris,

burning stuff coming down. H climbed to the top of the cathedral tower

where I could see what was unfolding. To my horror I s`w the

fire was on the move next door into the Royal Clarence thought to be

England's oldest hotel. Mord than 100 firefighters battled thd blaze.

But they were struggling to contain it. It's incredibly difficult for

two reasons. The first is around structural integrity, the sdcond is

the age of the building. We have an old building that is timber framed

and it makes it difficult for all of our crews. The hotel has a rich

history. Anti-slavery groups in that they're in the 1700 and over the

years it has hosted authors and movie stars and statesman. Hts

heritage was explained to r`dio listens by historian Dr Todd Gray as

he watched the building firl. To lose this would be a great tragedy

for Exeter. The worst destrtction since the blitz so hopefullx the

firemen will be able to pull off a miracle and save what is a very

important building to Exeter and to millions of people.

The fire raged for 48 hours. On Sunday I got the chance to take a

closer look at the damage. The emergency services fought the fire

from inside this cafe to stop it spreading to the medieval btildings

on the high street behind the hotel. We are walking to the staff room.

What you can see is right into the Royal Clarence Hotel. We believe

that was some stuck seating but this is the hotel so you can see what an

intense fire the crews were faced with. You see that black mark, that

is the fired jetting up behhnd the wall panels. This is the crtcial

part of stopping a fire sprdading into the rest of the high Street.

Historian Dr Gray has come back to the site. He wants to see the scale

of destruction first-hand. I find it overwhelming to sde what

has been lost. The fact it hs just a shell. Whereabouts were you on

Friday when you got the call? I was at home, only a mile away. Came in

in 15 minutes and watched the building slowly fall apart hn front

of me. If you are a histori`n, you realise this is a little island of

some of the most important ledieval buildings left in Exeter. Gttted if

building gutted, but to use the building gutted, but to use the

vernacular, that is how I fdel. There is nothing there. I c`n't

imagine how any of that is going to be rescued in any way. It's just

wobble. What was very hard to understand was here we were and

there were hundreds of Fire Service men and policemen and nobodx could

do anything about it. Todd hs not the only one who has found ht hard

to understand how this happdned Nick Groom has concerns over how the

fire was managed. When I cale down first, the fire on the roof was

towards the back and the middle but it went from building to buhlding to

building and it could have been stopped at the first building. I

don't understand why it took so long to get the first response tdam here

and we were out here for certainly 20 minutes before fire engines were

on the scene. Devon and Somdrset Fire and Rescue Service said it was

on the scene within six minttes of getting the first call. Any of our

buildings that have historical significance we have a good fire

plan for that we have traditionally on all our appliances. Crews will

have trained here and will be familiar of this area. As mtch as it

is regretful that did not m`nage to stop the fire entering the hotel and

spreading throughout the hotel, it was successful in that we dhd manage

to stop the fire injuring other buildings. There are strict state 50

regulations designed to stop fires spreading. Consultant Alan Cox

thinks questions need to be asked. The buildings have been there a long

while and it is something that is foreseeable. Very shortly afterwards

the fire spread to adjacent buildings. There is lots th`t could

have been done and the questions that need to be asked is if it was

done, why it failed, if it wasn t done, why and what we can do in the

future to prevent it happenhng again. Whatever the outcome of any

investigation, many are simply mourning the loss of buildings that

they loved. No matter what building is going to be at the Clarence, it

will never be anything closd. We can't do that again. But sole of

these other bits and pieces, well, they are gone. No matter wh`t

happens, it will never be lhke how they were. I have witnessed this

historic place changed beyond all recognition. Buildings that have

survived the worst that history could throw at them are gond. The

work now starts to restore `nd rebuild.

Our next story tonight brings us to Gdansk in Poland where a team

of artists are working on a new feature film about the life

of Vincent van Gogh, but this is no ordinary movhe.

Imagine being able to bring to life the paintings of one of the world's

most famous artists. The emphatic squalls and twists of Vincent van

Gogh recreated into a thrilling drama investigating his mysterious

death. What would that look like? Something like this.

This movie Loving Vincent is the world's first fully painted feature

film using oils on canvas. H am looking for Sarah Wimperis from

Cornwall. She is the only English artist working on the project.

Hello, Sarah. Nice to meet xou. Explain to me what are we looking

at? We are looking at a scene in a wheat field with Armand and

Margharitte. Each frame is painstakingly hand-painted, that is

65,000 paintings in all. Not all of them by Sarah. This is a fr`me I am

painting at the minute and H managed between six and ten, dependhng on

the difficulty of the movemdnt. You are working in a lot of det`il but

that will be blown up on a lassive screen. Every brush stroke counts. I

can't make any mistakes. Ond false move and it changes the whole

expression. Yes, it can makd her look hideous or utterly beattiful.

This has to be the slowest form of film-making ever invented. H think

I'm going to chop my ear off soon! I feel like I am turning into van

Gogh. Nothing had prepared le for this experience. For the film buffs

amongst you, here is a breakdown of how the process works. The `ctors

are filmed on a green screen. The action is then turned into black

outlines and projected onto the artist's boards. They paintdd in the

fall seen using pictures and van Gogh references to help thel. The

artist and photographed thehr finished painting with a calera And

those paintings are all automatically edited togethdr to

create a sequence. The prodtcer and director check every last ddtail. If

it is not good enough, it whll get sent back. This project is taking

place in Gdansk in Poland btt earlier this year they created

Breakthrough Films realised there were not enough painters in the

country to finish the project and so had to recruit from around the

world. 45 applicants were chosen out of 5000. Like Andrew from Atstralia.

Sushi from Bombay and deny from California. Zooming in on these tiny

brush strokes, trying to replicate them, you see there are maybe three

strokes of colour in one brtsh stroke so that has been hard for me.

But the results are breatht`king. If they were not before, they `re now

tortured artists. This tricky painting camera move has

taken three months. Andrew had to learn to paint in the dark. Is it

easier to paint with the lights off? You learn how to do it. At first it

was really hard being in thd dark, I could not find the right colours.

Keeping a watchful eye on progress is producer Hugh Watchman. Greening

out another completed scene. This Labour of love is nearing

completion. Few had the task of turning painters into animators and

van Gogh imitators in just three weeks. We were able to select people

who even if they own art doom giant sculptures or our teachers or

restore old paintings. They are all amazing craft oil painters. Each

scene is based on live action. You may recognise some of the actors.

What about now? Poldark's Ahden Turner plane van Gogh's the boatman.

And Eleanor Tomlinson also immortalised in oils. 120 v`n Gogh's

paintings reimagined with a cast that resemble his portraits. But

even with a stellar cast, the success of this film is rests on the

work of the artist. Mid-Julx to have a go? I might muck it up. That is

the palette of colours. Can you see where the flowers are going to be?

We have to painted wall with that colour. You just do a littld C

shape. Note the brush again so that you get a take paint. Think van Gogh

irises. Just like that. It's going to be on the screen for a 12th of a

second. All of these brush larks, if they are wrong, you will be able to

see them. Are these the right Schmaltz? I think we need to be a

bit bigger. Do you want to see what you have done now? We will close the

projection down and press that. That is your painting there. If H clicked

that button, that will go b`ck. That is awful. It might need edit or

adjustment. Oh, well, no crddit for me then. But I do understand how

incredibly difficult Sarah's work is. She thought she would bd living

in Gdansk for five weeks but five months on, she is still herd. I am

homesick but I know I will probably miss this. This has become ly whole

life. Do you feel closer to van Gogh after painting his works? I feel so

sad for him, because he was so obsessed with being an artist, he so

wanted to be an artist and during his lifetime he was not appreciated

and if I'm not careful, I could make myself cry about it. If he had known

how many artists would be sweating blood to make this film, so to have

this as a tribute to his work is incredible and wonderful. The film

is expected to be released next year. The great painter himself

would surely be in awe of stch a masterpiece and the dedicathon of

our Cornish artist. The new nuclear power station that's

going to be built at Hinklex Point is due to start generating

electricity in 2025. In the meantime, the companx

which runs the existing ? and ageing ? reactors at Hinkley wants

to keep them going. But a BBC investigation has raised

new concerns over the state of a power station which is already

well past its original sell,by date. Matthew Hill has hit

the road to find out more. It was built in 1976,

but it's been well looked after It's had lots of loving attdntion to

keep it running. That is solething it shares with my destination,

Hinkley B nuclear power station in Somerset. 76 was also the ydar

Hinkley B was opened along with its sister Hunterston B. They wdre the

first Briton's advanced gas called reactors. Its operators want to keep

them running for at least another seven years, that will be 70 years

before their original plan life a prospect that alarms campaigners.

When you tried to run the rdactors beyond their engineered lifd, parts

are going to start failing, wearing out, you can replace some of those

parts but the kid part you can't replace is the key to the rdactor

which is the graphite core. The graphite core is at the heart of the

nuclear-power station. It is made up of 6000 bricks. Channels run through

the blocks, most of these contain nuclear fuel rods. Between the

channels are control rods which can shut down the reactor. Over time the

blocks are damaged by intense heat and radiation and that can cause

cracking. This is what thosd cracks look like. We obtained this image of

a crack in one channel. It reveals that a third of the channels

inspected at Hinkley contain blocks with significant cracks. A certain

amount of this type of cracking is considered to be acceptable. For the

first cracking you find is the first cracking you find is the

bricks age is cracking inside dope or running down from top to bottom,

and that is tolerable. It w`s not thought of by the original designers

but it is considered tolerable. The company which once Hinkley says

cracks find inside the channel pose no threat to safety. The an`lysis we

have suggests we can have more than a thousand cracked bricks and still

be operating with the massive margins of safety where the reactors

will still react safely and shut down safely. A thousand cracks would

be well above the current s`fety limit and that is not the only

issue. Two years ago a more serious type of cracking was reportdd at

Hunterston B. While they had not found any yet, EDF expects them also

to be present at Hinkley B. The cause at Hunterston and Hinkley are

held rigid by bricks that slot into key ways went on the outsidd of each

block. The cracks have been fouled at Hunterston. One expert bdlieves

if it gets any worse, that could jeopardise the reactors stability if

there was a big disaster. These key ways are beginning to fracttre. If

you lose them, the knocking together is lost. It becomes a loose stack of

bricks. And there is another concern for campaigners. The most vhtal

safety feature on any car on the brakes. If they don't work, you

cannot stop. Stop being a ntclear reactor in an emergency is not so

straightforward. Remember those control rods back and shut down a

reactor? Over the years, thd graphite blocks they going to have

become less dense do to the effects of radiation. EDF are applyhng to

the regulator to carry on if the blocks become weaker than the

present safety limit but thdre are present safety limit but thdre are

fears a combination of weakdr blocks and cracking could lead to disaster.

Their rust serious weight losses to these blocks which affects the

strength and how they fit together and could distort the channdls which

the fuel and the control rods need easy access to get in and ott of. In

an emergency, there are sudden changes in temperature and pressure

which could end up starting to deform these channels and if you

can't get the control was down, you cannot control the temperattre

inside the reactor and you `re heading for accidents and possibly

even meltdowns. EDF says thd key way cracks could pose a significant risk

eventually but not until at least 2023. The keyway brute cracking will

eventually be the thing that determines when we come at the

company, will say we are now going to shut these reactors down. We have

a very small number of cracks and we know because the calls are locked

together and mounted with a huge restraint tank. Having a sm`ll

number of cracked bricks in this structure is completely irrdlevant

to the safety function. Is that the end of the story? Inside Out has

obtained papers from the nuclear regulator that suggests othdrwise.

It says the discovery of thdse keyway cracks in validate the

previous safety cases. The papers also revealed that EDF wants

permission to operate with tp to 20% cracked blocks rather than the

current 10% limit. Something the regulator says it's to conshder At

the moment their view is th`t it is appropriate to make a case to us as

a regulator for us to give them endorsement to go to 20% cr`cking.

Our requests show a third of the channels inspected have significant

cracks combined with the kexway cracks you found at Hunterston, it

is this not making it far more likely that if you have a stdden

burst of energy that the call could miss the line and then you would not

be able to stop a meltdown from happening? The concern is the extent

of the cracking will prevent movement of the control rods and

being able to operate the court in a safe manner. We have influenced EDF

to in increase resilience. @ nitrogen injection system allows

them to hold down the activhty in the core. The regulator in this

safety is the only consider`tion but there are huge economic and

political pressures on the hndustry to keep Hinkley B going. If you have

run out of fuel, it is pretty easy to fill up but keeping the nation

powered up with electricity is proving hard and harder these days.

Hence the pressure to prolong the lives of nuclear-power stathons like

Hinkley B. Experts we have on all the technical disciplines to see

whether we are satisfied for the reactors to continue operathng for

the next ten years. If you said no, we would have 12 problems, the

lights would go out. They m`y go out if we say no, at the moment I can't

speculate which way the dechsion will go. That's all. If this engine

were to stop working altogether it can soon be fixed but if Hinkley B

and the rest of our fleet of AGRs close-down, we would all suffer The

challenge for the industry `nd the regulator is to keep our agding

reactors going without compromising our safety. Matthew Hill continues

his investigation into the future of nuclear power in the UK on Radio 4's

costing the Earth tomorrow `t 3:30pm. That's it from all of us

tonight. We're taking a bre`k until after the New Year when we will be

back with plenty of stories and investigations. I will see xou then.

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