HALL COUNTY, Ga. — Wildfires are burning across Georgia once again, all because of the combination of dry conditions and strong winds.
It is wildfire season, putting everyone at risk, no matter where they live— urban or rural.
The Georgia Forestry Commission tracks wildfires in real time.
Firefighters are urging people to remember how quickly wildfires can spread, no matter how small the fires are when they start.
One of the brush fires on Wednesday was in north Hall County, on Ben Parks Road in Murrayville.
It was a small one, but it burned fast through the dry brush and trees, and the sheriff’s office closed Ben Parks Road while Hall County firefighters put it out.
Mark Miller, who was working, Wednesday evening, to clean up the debris and repair fencing said a spark from a lawnmower started the fire.
He’s relieved firefighters arrived quickly before it could spread to nearby homes.
“These pines right here are dead,” Miller said. “There's probably 110 acres across the road here. And if it jumps back across the road, then it's just going to take off in a blaze.”
The Hall County Fire Marshal, Division Chief Michael Viera, said the whole department is trying to urge people to remember how quickly the smallest brush fires can start and then spread into large, uncontrolled fires.
“We've got dry grass, we have dry leaves, dry sticks and windy conditions especially. It can spread very rapidly,” Chief Viera said Wednesday.
It was in 2016 when wildfires burned tens of thousands of acres of forest across north Georgia.
This past summer, suffocating smoke from the wildfires in Canada spread across the U.S. and into Atlanta.
Viera said people should check their fire marshals’ websites daily for information on fire conditions.
He said even when conditions on any given day do allow people to receive burn permits that day, the conditions are still risky-- this time of year especially.
“And so I recommend clearing an area away from the fire, just all the loose debris, and having a water source nearby for extinguishment,” Viera said. “Please don't use gasoline or other flammable liquids to start the fires, and make sure that somebody is there to watch it continuously.”
Otherwise, he said, if it were to burn out of control, it could be next to impossible to stop right away.