“BLACK MOUNTAIN, NORTH CAROLINA — Officials say a wildfire that scorched hundreds of acres in Black Mountain is 20 percent contained.
Fire officials say the wind is playing a big role in the difficulty of fighting the fire that’s damaged six structures, including four mobile homes, destroying one of those homes.
Fire officials say the fire started around 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday off Exit 66 on Dunsmore Avenue. That’s in the Ridgecrest area of Buncombe County.
More than 500 acres had burned as of 8 p.m., Black Mountain Fire Chief Steve Jones said. He also says the flames were 100-feet tall at one point.
At 3:30 p.m., a helicopter dropped off North Carolina Forest Service crew and then went back up to drop buckets of water on the wildfire.
At least 20 different agencies are on the scene to help contain the wildfire, including Red Cross. Chief Jones says protecting houses is one of the biggest concerns right now.
“We think we have everyone evacuated that needs to be,” Chief Jones said. “However, if you live in this area and you’re close to the fire, we suggest you just leave.”
Homes on Dunsmore Avenue were evacuated, but around 9 p.m. people safely returned back to their homes.”
Officials said a woods fire in Franklin, North Carolina, is now contained.
Michael Wilkins, district ranger for the U.S. Forest Service, said the fire started around 2 p.m. Thursday and burned about 85 acres of land off Highway 64 on Corundum Hill Road in the Cullosaja Gorge Community.
Wilkins said the high winds, low humidity and steep, rocky country presented some challenges. He said 15 or 20 homes are in the area, but the fire burned around them and has not caused any damage to the homes. Homeowners evacuated on their own and are in a safe location.
The North Carolina Forest Service leads the joint effort to fight the woods fire, with the U.S. Forest Service, Macon County Fire Service, Macon County Emergency Management and local fire departments assisting, officials said. The Cullasaja Gorge Fire and Rescue department was the main fire department on scene, but others also helped.
Cullasaja Gorge Fire and Rescue Chief Paul Corbin said about 100 total personnel and about 20 trucks responded to the scene.
Law enforcement officers with the North Carolina Forest Service (NCFS) were named the 2014 Investigative Team of the Year by the North Carolina Chapter of the International Association of Arson Investigators at the North Carolina/South Carolina Arson Conference in Myrtle Beach. The event was attended by more than 360 fire investigators, fire marshals and detectives from both states.
Left to right, Amery Wells, law enforcement supervisor, N.C. Forest Service; Capt. David Newton, Scotland County Sheriff’s Office; Michael Hardin Jr., senior assistant district attorney, District 16A; Sam Niemyer, D-3 law enforcement district ranger, N.C. Forest Service; Jamie Laviner, investigator, Scotland County Sheriff’s Office. Not pictured: Kristy Newton, district attorney, District 16A, and Dawn Layton,chief assistant district attorney, District 20A.
The honor was bestowed upon NCFS Law Enforcement Supervisor Amery Wells, Law Enforcement Rockingham District Ranger Sam Niemyer and other members of the team for an investigation that took place between July 2011 and May 2012. During that period, 78 fires were intentionally set in Scotland, Richmond and Hoke counties. The team used a combination of strategies to narrow down the case to a single suspect who would later be charged and convicted on 50 felony counts of setting fires and malicious use of incendiary devices.
Robert Smith, NCFS chief of law enforcement, said the investigation was challenging and unique due to the geographic area that covered portions of three counties, eight fire districts and two prosecutorial districts, among other factors. He pointed out that investigating a series of fires, even if a few are in the same general area, is complicated.
“Effective communications between investigative team members and numerous resources from different counties and fire districts was critical to the success of this investigation,” Smith said.
Smith said developing the working relationships and overall trust between all of those parties was essential. He credited the team with doing an outstanding job to develop and nurture longstanding relationships that transcended jurisdictional lines and using their individual strengths and skills to work extremely well together.
“They used a combination of good old-fashioned investigative skills mixed with technology such as tracking devices and GIS mapping, to put together a thorough case,” he said.
The factor of time and distance repeatedly challenged investigators to develop new strategies for static and mobile surveillance that covered a large geographic area over a lengthy time span. It was, however, a challenge to get the legal authority to use the tracking device. In January 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision in U.S. vs. Jones that required a search warrant for tracking devices. In May 2012, judges were still new to this case, as was the investigative team, making the warrant process more time-consuming than normal. The team collaborated on proper verbiage and content prior to discussing the case with the signing judge to be sure everything was in proper order and to the letter of the law.
The team also had the daunting task of collecting and analyzing a large volume of data, evidence, leads, witness interviews, photographs and other information, which quickly became a huge undertaking to sort and track. There was also the ongoing process of analyzing the data to formulate hypotheses, which was even more challenging and often frustrating for the team.
The suspect turned out to be a former law enforcement officer. As such, he was familiar with investigative tactics, interview techniques and surveillance techniques. It was later determined that he was also using a scanner to monitor radio traffic of emergency response personnel.
“Considering all of the challenges, the investigative team maintained a unified and determined effort to bring successful closure to one of the most complex wildland fire investigation cases in North Carolina history,” Smith said.
The team invested more than 1,000 man hours of time and resources and wrote in excess of 1,000 pages of discovery evidence. Their work led to 52 felony charges for intentionally setting fires and use of malicious incendiary devices, and a $1 million dollar bond set for the suspect, the largest in North Carolina for a wildland fire case. The suspect pleaded guilty in November 2013 to 50 of the 52 felony charges and was ordered to pay more than $15,000 in restitution. He was sentenced to 60 months of supervised probation to begin in May 2016 at the end of an unrelated federal prison sentence.
“I’m very proud to have played just a small role in this investigation. But even more so, to have witnessed the amount of dedication, professionalism and teamwork these guys demonstrated throughout this entire investigation,” Smith said. “They are all very deserving of this award for 2014.”
Morrison’s family will receive visitors at Holloman-Brown Funeral Home, Great Bridge Chapel, located at 524 Cedar Road in Chesapeake on Saturday, March 9 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. A memorial service will be held Sunday, March 10 at 2 p.m. at the Knotts Island Fire Department located at 327 Knotts Island Road.
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Scott Morrison, Chief of the Knotts Island Volunteer Fire Department that serves areas in both North Carolina and Virginia died in the line of duty Sunday afternoon while working on a brush fire, collapsing into respiratory and cardiac arrest at the scene. Randall Edwards, public information officer for Currituck Co., said the Chief was treated at the scene by Currituck EMS and also while en route to a hospital in Virginia.
According to his Facebook page, Chief Morrison became a firefighter in 1984 and worked his way up through the ranks. He leaves behind a wife and two children.
We offer our sincere condolences to Chief Morrison’s family and his fellow members of the fire department.
Firefighters in North Carolina’s Pilot Mountain State Park hope to have an escaped prescribed fire 90 percent contained by the end of the day on Monday. On Thursday the burn boss and New River State Park Superintendent Joseph Shimel supervised the ignition of the fire intending to burn 180 acres, but in the afternoon a dead tree near the fireline torched, sending burning embers into steep terrain outside the project’s perimeter, eventually blackening about 800 acres over the weekend.
According to the Winston-Salem Journal, Charlie Peek, public information officer for the N.C. Division of Parks and Recreation said the escaped fire:
…pretty much illustrated why we need prescribed burns, because any time fire hits this area — leaf litter, debris and brush — it’s much more difficult to control, and things can get out of hand much more quickly.
Previously the largest prescribed fire in the Park had been 35 acres. Small burns had been conducted in 2004 and 2009.
A 150-acre fire in Chowan county in North Carolina destroyed two unoccupied hog houses, but yielded some interesting photos. Here’s one, courtesy of WAVY TV, but go to the site to see several more.
