A Lewis County resident using an illegal burn barrel reportedly caused a brush fire Wednesday that took local and state firefighters more than a day to contain and extinguish.
Lewis County Fire District 5 Chief Dan Mahoney said they received a call about 10 a.m. of a brush fire along Brown Road East.
“It was an accidental set by a neighbor that was burning some trash. He was using a burn barrel … It got out of hand, out of his contained barrel he was burning and took off across the hill with the wind,” Mahoney said.
When firefighters got to the scene, they called in backup from Lewis County Fire District 6 in Chehalis, the Riverside Fire Authority and state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) firefighters to protect nearby houses that were in danger, Mahoney said.
The fire grew to about 15 to 20 acres in size. Fire District 6 handed command off to DNR, which brought in several engines, excavators and a helicopter that Mahoney estimates dropped about 25 buckets of water. Mahoney said Fire District 6 used close to 10,000 gallons of water to stop the fire.
DNR was able to extinguish the fire and left the scene about 1 p.m. Thursday.
“We’re very thankful for the help. DNR was a big asset having them there with their assets,” Mahoney said.
Firefighters also had additional help, according to a message sent to The Chronicle by Kyle Norman, who said Brad Hagseth and Hagseth Excavating left a job site and used an excavator and bulldozer to “help stop the fire from taking homes and spreading to the timber.”
A total burn ban has been in place in Lewis County since July 10 due to the dry and hot conditions. Under the ban, recreational wood fires, charcoal briquettes, fireworks, incendiary devices, smoking outside of a cleared area and many other forms of burning are prohibited. Some pressurized gas and propane stoves are still OK to use.
More information can be found online at www.lewiscountywa.gov.
