Fire departments welcome rainy forecasts after exhausting week of ‘back-to-back’ fires
Photos courtesy J. B. Duke, Tecumseh VFD By late afternoon Monday, Tecumseh Volunteer Fire Department had responded to five brush fires that day alone, “and we’re fixing to go again,” TVFD assistant chief J. B. Duke told the Times. Above: Tecumseh firefighters Josh and Adrianna Sherman refill one of the department’s brush trucks with foam, which firefighters use to “smother” brush and chemical fires, Duke said.
Ozark County’s volunteer fire departments have stayed busy the last few days responding to “controlled burns that got out of control,” as one firefighter described it.
Sunday afternoon, Gainesville VFD chief Ed Doiron asked the Times to post a Facebook plea asking residents not to burn. “Nearly all the departments in the county have been out fighting fires,” he said.
On their own Facebook pages, area fire departments shared the National Weather Service’s “elevated fire danger” warnings that cited “southwest winds 10 to 15 mph with gusts 25 to 35 mph, low relative humidity less than 30% and dry fuels.”
This week’s sheriff’s report (see pages 7-8) includes dozens of calls about controlled burns and brush fires. Not all calls reported by the fire departments appear in the call log.
Dora VFD chief Monte Shipley said Monday that his department responded to eight fires between Thursday and Sunday. “They’re coming back to back,” he said wearily.
When DVFD responded to one fire that was called in by someone around midnight, the firefighters had to wake up the property owner, who had gone to bed, Shipley said. The owner told them it was a controlled burn, but he hadn’t called it in to report it to the sheriff’s office, as landowners are advised to do, he said. The firefighters left the scene, satisfied the fire was contained.
Late Monday afternoon, Tecumseh VFD assistant chief J. B. Duke told the Times that department had also stayed busy – responding to five fires on Monday alone. A couple of the blazes had come close to some structures, but firefighters managed to save them all – including one where the flames came “right up to the tin” of a metal-sided barn building, Duke said. The department pumped 2,000 gallons of water on one 100-acre fire on KK Highway, he said.
The fire danger was expected to lessen by midweek, when the weather forecasts predict rain ranging from 1 to 9 inches.