MADISON COUNTY, Ky. (LEX 18) — More than half of the Commonwealth is currently in moderate drought status – 56% to be exact. The lack of rain has raised the level of concern for potential wildfires in places around the state.
Despite the green trees and growing grass, spring is one of two fire seasons in Kentucky.
“There’s one in the spring in one of the fall,” said Lt. Brent Billings with the Berea Fire Department. “There’s still a lot of fuel on the ground with leaves and dead grass and sticks from the winter, last fall, that can burn very easily.”
The lack of rain this spring especially has concern levels up.
“On a scale of one to 10 it’s probably a seven,” Billings said of his concern level. “The grass is really dry, the wind is starting to pick up. Those conditions are very bad for wildfires, grass fires, things like that.”
In Madison County this week, there have already been some fires. The Red Lick Volunteer Fire Department fought a fire down Dreyfus Rd. There have also been some prescribed burns, like just off of Big Hill Road near Berea College’s Forestry Outreach Center.
“It’s usually during fire season or around this time because the fuel is right and it’s ready to burn,” Billings shared. “Right now, Berea College Forestry is doing a prescribed burn on their land. They have notified us and we worked with them on getting that set up and ready to go.”
Billings said that this time of year, a lot of controlled burns can get out of hand. He urged the public to give them a call when that happens, sooner rather than later.
“What we see a lot of is out of control burns where people have a controlled burn and they leave and they come back and it’s out of control," he said. "The sooner you can give us a call whenever you have something out of control, the faster we can get there and the faster we can put it out and get it contained.”
In dry times like this, Billings says it’s important to call local fire departments before deciding to burn anything.
“See what the burn restrictions are for that day,” he added. “If the winds are high, we won’t allow any control burns. It just gets out of control too fast.”
