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Tin Man
03-17-2006, 22:17
Fire ignites Botetourt forest

Firefighters were working off Salt Pond Road to try to contain the flames.
By David Harrison
981-3349

Fire tore through a forested ridge east of Troutville in Botetourt County on Thursday night, sending firefighters from various agencies scrambling up the mountain to contain it.

The fire was first reported about 8:30 p.m. off Salt Pond Road, which winds its way through the Jefferson National Forest and crosses the Appalachian Trail and the Blue Ridge Parkway.

It wasn't immediately clear whether the fire was on private land or in the national forest. The fire's cause and the number of acres it consumed were also unclear as of Thursday night.

The extent of the fire was visible from Bill Romig's back porch on the other side of Houston Mines Road. Romig pointed to a ridge the flames had crested, setting the whole mountain aglow.

"It wasn't there before," he said.

Thursday's fire comes almost a week after another blaze on the other side of the mountain, near the Bedford County line, scorched about 1,100 acres.

It comes a day after Botetourt County imposed a ban on all outdoor burning.

Dry weather and high winds have left Southwest Virginia vulnerable to fires. On Saturday a brush fire burned about 5 acres off Yellow Mountain Road in Roanoke County.

Besides Botetourt County, several jurisdictions across the area, including Franklin, Bedford and Roanoke counties, have banned all outdoor burning.

Four families live on Salt Pond Road, Romig said. As he spoke, his telephone rang. It was a neighbor, checking up on him and inquiring about the families on Salt Pond Road.

John Manspile, chief of the Buchanan Volunteer Fire Department, said he did not know whether the families had been evacuated or whether anybody had been hurt in the blaze.

Manspile was among several firefighters standing at the intersection of Salt Pond Road and Houston Mines Road.

Another staging area was higher up the mountain, he said, from where firefighters were clearing brush and establishing a line to stop the flames.

A bulldozer lumbered up the road, on its way to the staging area.

"It'll go anywhere except straight up," he said. "Then he'll get up in the brush and put a line around it if he can."

The weather forecast calls for only a slight chance of showers this morning, followed by cooler and windy conditions the remainder of the day.

Newb
03-18-2006, 15:23
It is VERY dry here in Virginia right now. We might get a little relief in the middle of the week, but twice this month rain forecasts have come to naught. I was down in the central Shen. Valley 2 weeks ago and I saw several morons burning rubbish in their yards.