18,000 cows killed in Texas dairy farm explosion, deadliest barn fire in US

Around 6.5 million farm animals have died in such fires in the last decade, most of them poultry

More than 18,000 cows died after an explosion and fire at a family dairy farm in Texas, making it the deadliest barn fire in US history.

Firefighters rescued one employee from the South Fork Dairy near Dimmitt as flames raced through a building and into holding pens, according to images and statements from the Castro County Sheriff’s Office.

The cause of the fire is being investigated, and it was not immediately possible to contact members of the family who own the farm in one of Texas' biggest milk production counties.

The blaze also prompted the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), one of the oldest animal protection organisations in the US, to call for federal legislation to prevent barn fires, which kill hundreds of thousands of farm animals every year.

There are no federal regulations protecting animals from fires, and only a few states, Texas not included, have adopted fire protection codes for such buildings, said news agency Reuters, quoting AWI.

"We hope the industry will remain focused on this issue and strongly encourage farms to adopt common sense fire safety measures," Allie Granger, policy associate for AWI's farm animal programme, told the BBC.

"It is hard to imagine anything worse than being burned alive," she added.

The blaze was the most devastating barn fire in the US involving cattle since the AWI began tracking such incidents in 2013. In the last decade, approximately 6.5 million farm animals, mostly poultry, have died in such fires.

(With agency input)