SWINDON, as most of us know, is twinned with Salzgitter in Germany and Ocotal in Nicaragua.

If the fire at Averies Recycling at Marshgate is allowed to burn for much longer, it might be as well to adopt another twin town: Centralia in Pennsylvania.

Thanks to an unquenchable underground coal fire, residents of Centralia were first nauseated by and then forced to flee from unending clouds of stinking smoke.

We are told that investigations are in progress to discover why the smoke is still issuing from the Marshgate site. Without wishing to seem flippant, our best guess is that the presence of the smoke – which is making the lives of thousands of men, women and children a misery – indicates that the fire is still burning after a week and a half.

The subject of the investigation should be how this situation came about.

Firefighters, who have behaved with impeccable dedication throughout the crisis, report difficulty in reaching certain parts of the site because of its layout. If this is the case, we hope the relevant authorities are taking note and will eventually act in accordance with whatever they discover.

It is comforting to know that bunding has been put in place to reduce the risk of the filthy run-off from the firefighters’ efforts finding its way into the River Cole. The pressing issue, however, remains the billowing smoke.

Blameless parties affected by that smoke could be forgiven for ‘lawyering-up,’ as the Americans put it.