The bodies of 55,000 pigs including breeding sows and piglets are still being recovered three weeks after the fire at the Alt Tellin farm and biogas facility in northeastern Germany, with ensuing protests against plans to rebuild. But even before the tragedy of March 30, the site had long been the subject of legal controversies and demonstrations from both local interest groups and animal protection activists.

On the morning of March 30, a massive cloud of smoke visible for miles around could be seen billowing from a farm near Jarmen in Vorpommern-Greifswald, Germany. At least one human was injured, and at the time it was feared around 5,000 pigs had succumbed to fire and smoke. That figure has since risen to 55,000 - 7,000 breeding sows and 50,000 piglets were listed at the facility yet only 1,300 were rescued. Some managed to escape into nearby fields, but most were not as lucky. 

Many pigs remain among the ruins and the rubble some three weeks later with the recovery expected to go on for many weeks longer. The fire burnt so fiercely that bodies of pigs quite literally fused into the plastic of their enclosures, making their recovery much harder as they are now classified as hazardous waste. They no more deserved this terrible fate than did the others who succumbed to the smoke, or indeed all the animals exploited and killed needlessly to be regarded as mere products of animal agriculture.

The warning signs at Alt Tellin were always there. According to a report by NDR, a local residents’ group and animal rights activists had predicted ten years ago that a fire could easily sweep through the farm and kill the many thousands of pigs living in 18 stables connected together with only one exit, and all of lightweight construction.

So great was concern about the facility that regular ‘inspections’ by activists were conducted throughout its construction, taking place every Monday for three years come rain or shine, resulting in numerous official investigations and fines handed out to Alt Tellin’s investors. Regular attendees brandished signs and placards, with group sizes ranging from a dozen to as many as 80 protestors. Those citizens’ inspections ended in 2014, but with a promise by the BI protest group to continue demonstrations in a different form. But not before they were able to draw mass media attention to Alt Tellin and garner the support of prominent politicians and associations including the chairman of the German Animal Welfare Association and the managing director of the Association for the Environment and Nature Conservation Germany.

In 2015, one such large scale demonstration took place. Animal rights groups together with a local interest group erected a giant pink cross outside the farm to protest against what was at the time one of the largest - if not the largest - pig breeding facilities in Europe with 10,000 sow places.

And in April last year, when Alt Tellin was sold to a new operator as part of a larger bankruptcy deal, it emerged that legal disputes still plagued the site with questions raised about whether or not it should ever have been built in the first place. This is on top of Neubrandenburg public prosecutor's office looking into possible violations of Germany’s Animal Welfare Act at Alt Tellin, following the death of more than 1,000 piglets due to the failure of a ventilation system.

Apparently, all this had been resolved when LFD Holding took over Alt Tellin after the bankruptcy of former owner, Dutchman Adrianus Straathof, who was banned from raising animals anywhere in Germany. A spokesperson for LFD said it had done "a lot in keeping and caring for the animals" with new owners Strehl eying up LFD Holding’s “circular economy from semen production via piglets to gilt rearing and fattening” which it said could supply a staggering 1.25 million homes in Germany with pig products from Alt Tellin alone.

Back to today, and even with Alt Tellin still in rubbles and the smell of countless decomposing pigs still heavy in the air - and no clear ruling on how the fire started or who was responsible expected until May, except for suspicion of ‘negligent arson’ - regional minister for agriculture Till Backhaus intends to submit a federal plan to resurrect the so-called ‘mega stables’. Regional employers' association MiLaN has called for Alt Tellin to be closed forever, demanding accountability for the cause of the fire, while Backhaus has continued to be accused of double standards in supporting and approving many such large facilities despite spouting hyperbole about promoting small stables and less harmful rural countryside practices. Read more about the backlash against Backhaus following the Alt Tellin disaster, including a complaint filed by PETA against operator LFD, in this report by NDR.

The protests by animal groups outside the state parliament continue with signs and banners demanding that the pigs be ‘let out’ and a giant inflatable pig helping to draw further attention to the cause. While local district authorities may have ruled the blaze to be a major fire, but not a disaster, the effect on the lives of the pigs was nothing less than devastating. But then they were always destined to be victims at the hands of humans in one way or another, be it as a result of this fire and the suspected negligence of the Alt Tellin operators, or when strung up from metal hooks and their throats sliced in a slaughterhouse after years of giving birth to piglets as a breeding sow in confinement, or after a few short months being raised for their flesh.

All we can hope is that the ensuing condemnation of Alt Tellin’s operators and the regional administration have vindicated many of the original fears surrounding such large scale intensive facilities, giving further weight to any opposition to other facilities in the future. Questions are being raised and now is the time for activists to utilise that focus in hammering home the message that animals will never be safe as long as animal agriculture endures.

Andrew Gough is Media and Investigations Manager at Surge.

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