Southern Wildfires: Over 80K Acres Burn as Officials Warn Against Arson

Pilots unfamiliar with the weather description FU are becoming reacquainted with the smoke obscuration designation as it pops up on terminal area forecasts with more regularity, said AOPA Southern Region Manager Steve Hedges. Two Locke firefighters went to the wildfire area earlier this week. While numerous fires started in remote locales, smoke is spreading far and wide across the region, prompting environmental and health officials to air quality warnings.

While one of the region’s biggest blazes – the Rough Ridge Fire in northern Georgia, where over 23,000 acres have been consumed – was started by lightning, officials worry that people acting carelessly or intentionally could set off a new inferno.

Alford said the Wake County crews would likely switch out personnel and leave their equipment in the mountains for the next wave of firefighters to use. “There’s not even a trickle going over the falls”, Kaila Fair, manager at the adjoining campground, said November 10.

“Coming from my end, I do feel like it’s getting better”, Thornton said Tuesday. “Our fires are really bad now”.

The smoke can irritate eyes and the respiratory system, as well as aggravate or exacerbate chronic heart and lung diseases, the alert stated.

“We were deployed to the Lake Lure area, and what they are calling the Party Rock fire”, he said.

Officials said 15 wildfires covering 45,000 acres in western North Carolina are to blame.

The flames also have moved into Buncombe County and forced evacuations there.

People who have heart or lung diseases, older adults, and children are more likely to be affected by health threats from wildfire smoke. Conditions on the ground remain dry – there has been no rain in the area for 46 days.

The fire scorched more than 6700 acres and caused evacuations in Rutherford and Henderson counties.

Winds kicked toward the south and fanned the acrid smoke past travelers navigating the bustling Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport where the odor was so strong that some thought the terminal was on fire.

The fire at South Mountains State Park is now estimated at 5,689 acres in steep terrain with an estimated containment of 30%.

A large wildfire burning through a rugged and thinly populated part of the north Georgia mountains this week sent a smoky haze over Atlanta.

The arrests come just as the state’s arson reward fund grows.

Volunteers from the coast are continually making their way west to help out. During windy weather, firefighters try to limit leaves from catching fire and starting a spot fire outside of those lines, Lyons said.

Of the 1,238 wildfires in the state so far this year, officials suspect arson in almost half of them.

Forsyth fire spokesman Jason Shivers said his county hadn’t received reports of wildfires but is under a burn ban that restricts recreational burns.