300 Fighting 6,500-Acre Fire in North Florida
About 300 firefighters Monday worked to tighten fire lines around a 6,500-acre brush fire, hoping for rain to extinguish the 5-day-old blaze.
Smaller fires had broken out around Florida, with 148 new blazes reported Sunday, including 50 begun by lightning in Sarasota, Charlotte and Manatee counties in the southwest, Division of Forestry spokeswoman Jodi Chase said.
Most of the southwestern fires were contained Monday, she said.
Guardsmen on Fire Lines
Firefighters, including National Guard troops and a crew from Alabama, worked Monday to widen fire lines around the blaze outside Madison, in northern Florida, before winds picked up, as forecast.
“The weather forecast is the same as it was yesterday and the day before,” Chase said. “That’s the weather that’s been giving us problems. Unless we get a lot of rain and (less) lightning, it’s no good.”
The fire was 13 miles long and five miles wide in Madison, Taylor and Lafayette counties. It posed no immediate threat to homes in the sparsely populated area.
Chase said that two minor injuries were reported Sunday, one to a forestry worker who suffered a minor eye injury and the other to a paper company employee who was hospitalized for heat exhaustion.
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