TX Authorities Spreading Word About Extreme Fire Danger Even In Houston, E. TX, Along Gulf Coast

[hatrack]

FORT WORTH, Texas — Hurricane season has reached the Gulf Coast, but electronic signs along Houston's freeways have been warning of extreme wildfire danger. This is among the latest oddities in what has become the state's worst wildfire season, where out-of-control blazes have charred nearly 5,100 square miles from arid West Texas to the thick East Texas woods near the Louisiana border. But fires also have surprised residents in some southeastern towns where rainfall and humidity usually dilute such threats by spring.

Now, with bone-dry conditions extending into the summer and a severe drought plaguing nearly all of Texas, authorities face the challenge of educating even the least fire-prone communities about how easily the blazes can start.

The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms unwittingly caused a 150-acre blaze in May while detonating explosives in a Panhandle dirt field, even though a fire truck was nearby because agents knew about Motley County's burn ban. No homes were damaged.

But dozens of homes in Austin and in several towns an hour's drive from Houston have been destroyed in wildfires sparked by a homeless man's campfire, a barbecue pit or bullets from hunters' target practice, despite widespread and well-publicized burn bans now affecting all but a couple dozen of the state's 254 counties.

EDIT

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7626626.html

[GliderGuider]

1. I thought carbon dioxide was supposed to be a fire extinguisher...

:evilgrin: