Early payoff from solar panel installation

I'm guessing a battery was installed in the attic - that's what's fuelling the fire and might explain why there's no water directed at the roof. Seem quite happy to let next door burn, with all the attendant risks . . .

Even so that's a suspiciously well fueled fire given there's not usually a great deal of flammable material on a roof - could well be a fake video.

Hard to fake that id say.

Roof fires are two a penny and solar panel fires are increasingly common. The risk from e.g. a meteorite or any other high speed object (next doors menace with a catapult) is significant.

Solar panels need regular service and inspection to comply with insurance.

If you look closely, they are mounted 'in roof' and not retro fitted 'on top' of the roof tiles. They effectively replace having any tiles. Very common now for new builds. I'd focus on whatever insulation they were lying on top of, and how buried the cables and connectors were within it. An inspection of any other house in that road will provide the answer

I believe you are right. I noticed that the laths were all burnt up...but didn't connect the dots.

Look at the part1 video, one of the panels crashes down off the roof.

My insurance company (Aviva) hasn't asked for that. I can't remember if I told them when I had the panels installed. I haven't had any service except when 1 panel had to be replaced due to a pigeon’s nest ruining the insulation.

Yes, I did notice - and very neat and efficient that system is. But very little that actually burns with a solar panel? A lot of flame there - more than cable, rafters and lathes would fuel?

I suppose they might have stored firewood or similar in the attic - difficult to tell. And of course there may have been a couple of banks of batteries up there too.

No,it's genuine, and very unlikely to be the battery, even if there was one. There was a similar fire around 6 weeks ago locally. I know the Company involved, they are legitimate, and do have trained Staff. It totalled the house, the enquiry has started, but the consensus seems to be a loose/poor connection between the panels, that connection overheated, set alight the cable insulation, which then set the panels themselves on fire - they have a lot of plastic in them, they are cheaply made, so I doubt any fire retardent material has been used in them. Flammable material on a roof? Have you seen the amount of wood used in a roof? With those built in panels, they sit direct onto the joist/trusses/whatever, with just a thin membrane below them. I'm pretty sure the membrane should be fire retardent , but who knows what standard they should meet, and how it was tested - Consumer Unit Makers should have supplied fire retardent plastic consumer units, but they didnt meet that requirement, but still sold them, and certified them as complying. Thats why metal consumer units were brought back in.

Plastic roof tile or plastic packed solar panels acting as tiles

Point is there dont seem to be any tiles on that roof at all.

Even tho laths are still there, altho charred.

And,not forgetting that they fit into a large thin plastic frame, that would be ideal for starting a fire. As in the first pic here:

Batteries mounted in lofts have been banned since April 2026, though that's not a retrospective directive

I think many in roof panel systems have plastic under trays...

Example of some being installed here:

I don't know about the panels in that video, but in general they are subject to quite stringent regulations:

Or installed at a time when regulation was weak.

Interesting (to me), though. Certainly something to watch.