Central Texas wildfire is 25 percent contained

It is also able to divide its load into five separate drops if needed.

Friday afternoon, Bastrop County officials announced the Hidden Pines fire had scorched more than 4,500 acres, but was now 40-percent contained. A smaller single engine air tanker dropped retardant on the area Thursday.

On top of the hill overlooking the Hidden Pine Valley, an area just west of Smithville, are the charred remains of pine trees destroyed by the 2011 Labor Day wildfire that ravaged more than 34-thousand acres, destroyed over 16-hundred homes and took the lives of two people.

11-year-old Raven Pumphrey, a student at Smithville Elementary, said she and her family are now staying at the Smithville Recreation Center in Bastrop County after being evacuated from their home Tuesday night. No deaths have been reported so far, and the authorities are now investigating the cause of the fire.

Bastrop County judge Paul Pape said they have dealt with fires before, but he appreciates the help the community receives. He says they’ve moved crews to the southwest part of the fire, to create bigger containment lines in an attempt to keep the fire from threatening more homes. “They’re going to be out there all night, and they’ll be there all day tomorrow, and they’ll be there until it is 100-percent contained”, said Mike Fisher, the emergency operations manager for Bastrop County.

“Prior to 2011, people who were in the business of fire suppression and response were very much aware that they were overdue for a wildfire and that conditions were right for serious property damage”, she said.

Just after midnight Thursday morning, the National Weather Service in San Antonio tweeted that the smoke plume from the fire was detectable from more than 22,000 miles away. The high temperatures reported around Austin are expected to drop, but humidity will remain low and dry, Weather Service meteorologist Cory Van Pelt told the AP.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott declared a state of disaster in Bastrop County on Thursday, as a wildfire continues to rage across more than 4,000 acres, according to CNN.

Dennis Moniger’s address is on the list of burned houses posted by county officials. He said the fire also destroyed his brother’s house nearby. “It jumped form treetop to treetop”.