Shelby Powell
reporter@thefranklinpress.com
Wildfires have peppered Western North Carolina for weeks amid a statewide burn ban from the North Carolina Forest Service and separate bans from the Macon County and Franklin governments. Within the past week, fires have burned at Alarka Road in Swain County, Kitchens Branch Road in Jackson County, and Big Ridge in Rabun County, Georgia. Winds on Saturday pushed a haze of smoke from those fires into Macon County on Saturday, but no wildfires were reported in the county.
The Kitchens Branch Road brush fire was perhaps the least severe, burning 94 acres and being totally contained as of March 29, according to the Macon County Ranger Benjamin Keener. Jackson County Emergency Management Services said first responders were first dispatched to the fire at 4:30 p.m. on March 26, and that the cause of the fire is still under investigation.
The Alarka Road fire is more serious, burning in the south of Swain County and covering an area of 1,511 acres at 37% containment, according to the N.C. Forest Service as of March 31. A report from the Smoky Mountain Times said the first report was made to dispatch at 3:44 p.m. on Tuesday, March 25. Though the fire’s management was initially handled by local Emergency Management, Swain EMS Director Brandon Wiggins said, the job has since been transferred to a multi-state incident management team from the Southern Area Coordination Center in Atlanta.
The Big Ridge Fire in Georgia’s Rabun County, to the northeast of Mountain City in the Warwoman Wildlife Management area, has grown to 2,964 acres and was 20% contained as of March 31, according to the U.S. Forest Service. The service reported that the fire began on March 22, and firefighters are forced to use “indirect tactics” due to the unusual terrain.
The service plans to “continue construction and improvement of direct and indirect fire control lines in all directions. Triage of structures adjacent to the eastern control lines will also continue,” according to the incident’s information page. The service also said it will work with Rabun County officials to ensure an evacuation plan is in place for the Sky Valley Community, though no evacuation order is currently in place.
Todd Seagle, 911 communications supervisor with Macon County, said that there has been an uptick in the rate of brush fire calls coming in, caused by neighbors reporting local fires within 100 feet of properties. Seagle said he believes that these burns are primarily happening because of a misunderstanding of the relationship between the state ban from the Forest Service and the Macon County and Franklin bans.
The Forest Service ban does not apply to fires started within 100 feet of an occupied property; such burns are banned by Macon County and Franklin. Some who have read the Forest Service ban but not the local bans may have misunderstood that burning within 100 feet of occupied properties is still off limits, Seagle said.
“We’ve been really lucky,” Seagle said, referring to the larger wildfires just outside the county to the north and south, and urged residents to continue to respect the ongoing burn bans even as some rain has fallen on the area over the weekend and on Monday.
Keener said he hoped that the rain would lessen the risk of further wildfires, but reminded residents that the burn ban remains in effect. He said that if locals had questions about whether or when the ban might be lifted, they should refer to the N.C. Forest Service Website.