Firefighting crews Saturday were still dousing hot spots from a Friday blaze that threatened several structures in the northeastern portion of Big Spring.

 

In what is fast becoming a depressing routine, an errant spark, coupled with high winds, proved the impetus for the fire, which ended up burning hundreds of acres north of Interstate 20 and east of Highway 350.

Fortunately, no structures were damaged and no one was injured.

Units from the Howard County Volunteer Fire Department, Big Spring Fire Department and state Forestry Service fought the blaze through the afternoon and evening and several units were still on site Saturday morning ensuring hot spots didn’t re-ignite the blaze.

HCVFD Chief Tommy Sullivan said the fire started when an errant spark from a welding torch caught some brush afire in the 2500 block of Hilltop Road Friday afternoon.

“After that, it was off to the races,” Sullivan said.

Pushed by a strong westerly wind, the fire moved rapidly toward the I-20/Highway 350 juncture.

Sullivan said firefighters decided to make their stand at Highway 350 for two major reasons — because the area to the east of the area was largely inaccessible to department vehicles, and to keep the fire from jumping 350 and burning its way through Mt. Olive Cemetery and several buildings to the east of the highway.

To guard against the fire turning south with a shift in the wind, officials had firefighting units posted at several areas along the north service road of the interstate.

With the fire thus boxed in, Sullivan directed firefighters to light back fires along 350 to, in effect, starve out the main blaze and not give it sufficient fuel to make the jump across the highway.

“If it had crossed (350) it would have started running toward Highway 87 and the truck stop and the nursing home there,” Sullivan said. “Trying to chase it would have been very difficult. That’s why we worked so hard to keep it east of 350.”

It did cross the highway at one point — near the old Crossroads Warehouse just south of the cemetery — but a pumping unit quickly doused the fire before it could spread further, Sullivan said.

In all, nine HCVFD units were joined by three units from Big Spring, as well as a Forestry Service helicopter, in combating the blaze.

The combination of high winds and high, dead grass in so many of the outlying areas in the county have kept firefighters busy the last several days and Sullivan expects no let-up anytime soon.

“Heck, we’re ready for a half-day off, much less a full day,” he joked. “But it’s like I tell them, it’s just another day at the office.

“We planned for this back in November, because we knew it would be like this come spring,” Sullivan added. “So many parts of West Texas have had bad fires recently, I guess it’s just our turn now.”

Contact Staff Writer Steve Reagan at 263-7331, ext. 234 or by e-mail at