GUSTING winds in the North-East could hamper efforts to contain the outbreak, a farmers' union representative said yesterday.

Gordon Meek, 44, who farms at Heddon-on-the-Wall in Northumberland, less than a mile from where Ministry of Agriculture workers were preparing to incinerate animal carcasses, said poor weather was not helping matters.

He said: "The Ministry of Agriculture has done a good job, but the wind is a major problem.

"It's not good news. We have to hope that this wind doesn't carry too many more foot-and-mouth disease germs to other farms."

Many farmers in the north of Northumberland have been snowbound after heavy snow falls and drifting, but Mr Meek, a National Farmers' Union livestock delegate, did not believe that would stop contamination of other herds.

"From the bits of information that I have picked up, the cold is not a cure," said Mr Meek.

He has been kept away from the nearby Prestwick Hall Farm, run by Ian Williamson, where carcasses were being piled up this afternoon, but he did not fear contamination from the dead animals as they were disinfected immediately after slaughter.

He sympathised with his neighbours, saying: ''It is sad to sit and watch them build the bonfire.

"The herd was their pride and joy and represents probably the best part of 30 years work, which has been wrecked overnight."