An historical ford, or river crossing, that has been in use for over 1,000 years within the UK has been closed after turning into a viral sensation on TikTok.

Rufford ford in Nottinghamshire, England, was blocked by the native council on the request of fireside and police providers who couldn’t deal with the sudden inflow of rescues following the crossing’s newfound web fame.

Like most fords, this one, which is a part of an everyday asphalt highway route, is barely greater than a dribble of water in dry climate and presents no barrier to visitors. However when the rain comes the water can swell to a number of toes deep and several other yards throughout.

Most locals knew of the hazard however you’d nonetheless get the odd optimistic idiot, or out-ot-towner underestimating the hazard and discovering themselves stranded and in want of a tow. And that’s the way it stayed for many years after the introduction of the automobile, however the web modified all that. In lower than three years YouTube and TikTok have managed to place an finish to one thing that predates Columbus’s arrival in America by nearly 500 years and had been in (nearly) day by day use since.

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In 2020 native teenager Ben Gregory (YT deal with: benregers) started importing movies of vehicles attempting to cross the ford to YouTube. Not each automobile would get caught, however that didn’t matter as a result of it was enjoyable attempting to guess which might make it and which might be marooned. And that wasn’t essentially straightforward. You would possibly get the odd Ford Fiesta that manages to surge by means of by hitting the water at simply the best pace and sustaining that tempo. However the subsequent car is likely to be a BMW X3 mistakenly presuming that that their SUV has the off-road skill of a Camel Trophy Land Rover, and pushed by somebody with no understanding of how one can drive by means of puddle, let alongside deep water.

However the actual gold is when the water is so deep that the automobile doesn’t simply cease useless, however begins to drift away; when the driving force is pressured to climb out and wade to the facet; when the driving force will get caught and is so humiliated he begins shouting on the individuals capturing the motion for the web.

Initially that was simply Gregory, however extra not too long ago others have additionally come alongside for a slice of the motion, some to movie their very own content material, others from miles away merely to observe in particular person. And that’s when issues began to get out of hand. Gregory’s YouTube movies had already clocked up thousands and thousands of views, however when the motion migrated to TikTok the ford’s notoriety exploded.

Out of the blue the crowds gathering on the ford on wet days had been a lot larger, and a few of the driving seen within the movies turned noticeably extra aggressive. You’d get drivers purposely steaming into the water at excessive pace, and native councilor Neil Clarke stated it was turning into harmful for each drivers and pedestrians.

“There was a motorcyclist who approached it at 50 mph, went full pelt, and got here straight off head over heels over the handlebars,” he instructed The Guardian. “He went so quick he bounced all the best way alongside the water earlier than collapsing on the opposite facet in a heap. It’s life-threatening.”

So the ford is now closed, that means Rufford Lane is genuinely impassable, regardless of how tall your air snorkel is, and more likely to keep that method for a while. In line with The Mirror, the council can’t afford to switch the ford with a bridge, however is investigating different methods to reopen the route.

In the meantime, Gregory, who has amassed nearly 17 million likes on TikTok and 65 million YouTube views, and the opposite content material creators have shifted their consideration to a few different websites round an hour’s drive away in Leicestershire.