PARENTS living near a mass foot-and-mouth burial site were forced to lock their children indoors as the putrid smell of rotten flesh enveloped their homes.

Families living in Tow Law, County Durham, say weekend rain caused flooding at the controversial Inkerman site, leaving the town engulfed with the sickening stench.

Rumours swept the village that emergency pumping equipment had to be installed to stop contaminated water pouring out of the site, and also that a £5m concrete dam was to be built to halt the flow of underground water. Ministry of Agriculture (Maff) spokeswoman denied there was any truth in either rumour.

Protesters, who have camped outside the site entrance since it opened, said residents were terrified that the fumes wafting into their streets were toxic.

Last night, Gary White and his wife Elizabeth told how their daughter Paige, eight, and her friends became ill from the smell on Saturday.

Mr White said: "The kids were out playing in the back street and my wife took them out an ice cream, and they were nearly throwing up.

"I took a man from the Environment Agency out to where the kids were playing and the smell wasn't there at first. Then it just came over and he was nearly sick."

Reassurances were given yesterday by Maff, which said the ministry and Wear Valley District Council had been monitoring the site. A spokeswoman said: "We have found that the gas levels are below the level of determination. They are one part per million."

New deodorising machinery would be taken to the site today to rid the town of the stench, and a series of lagoons would be built to deal with surface water.

She said: "As part of on-going works and maintenance on the site, a small section of one of the trenches was opened and then closed in order to extract leachate liquid that comes off as the animals decompose."

l Six new cases of foot-and-mouth were confirmed nationwide yesterday, including one at Kirkby Malzeard, near Ripon, North Yorkshire.

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