GA Wildfires 90 percent contained
GA Wildfires 90 percent contained
11 June 2007
published by www.walb.com
USA — Recent rains are giving firefighters and forestry crews fightingGeorgia’s wildfires a break. The fires burning in Ware, Charlton, and Clinchcounties are now 90 percent contained.
Two new fires erupted Sunday in Clinch and Atkinson Counties, but werequickly contained. Forestry officials and fire fighters are now turning theirattention from knocking down flames to focusing on hot spots that couldre-ignite. Crews are also beginning to mop-up. That involves dozer crewsclearing roads into the swamp areas so that crews can flood those areas withwater to douse fires in the peat. It also means fewer crews are needed.
“We’ve dropped back probably 500 to 600 people away from what we hadgoing about 1,500 down to about 1,000, between 900 and a thousand people. A lotof these people that are still there what they’re doing is a mop up operations,”said Gary English, Ranger-1.
It will likely be several months before crews completely pull out of the area.The fires have cost 52.7 million dollars to fight and have involved more than15-hundred forestry personnel and fire fighters.
