Workmen in Britain were today preparing a mass foot-and-mouth burial site for thousands of carcasses at a disused Cumbrian airfield.
Infected sheep carcasses being loaded on to trucks in Cumbria over the weekend.
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Diggers have extracted thousands of tons of earth to construct the first of several burial trenches which now stretches up to 90 metres long, five metres wide and four metres deep.
The construction work - being overseen by the army - is taking place at the former Great Orton airfield near Carlisle where later today 1,200 dead sheep will be removed from sealed wagons and emptied into the enormous livestock grave.
British army spokesman Maj Guy Richardson said: "Contractors have been working throughout the night in order to start with the aim of putting the carcasses in this morning."
Four sealed wagons containing the carcasses were already on site. Before seals on the wagons are broken the army will close the site.
There will be a mass disinfectant process before MAFF and environmental inspectors come on site to establish that all necessary safety procedures have been carried out before the sheep are buried.
The total number of cases of the disease in the UK now stands at 607.
PA