‘Good progress’ made on largest Texas blaze
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Texas fire officials reported “good progress” early Friday on the largest of the blazes searing the state, as the Bastrop County Complex fire failed to grow in size and dozens of residents continued to trickle back to their homes.
The roughly 35,000-acre fire has destroyed 1,386 homes (the most lost in a single blaze in the state) and killed two people. It was 30% contained Friday, the Texas Forest Service said. But enough hot spots remained that, on Thursday, firefighters had to rescue utility crew members from their bucket trucks when wind stirred up some nearby flames.
‘They are fine. Their equipment is fine,’ Mike Fisher, the county’s emergency management coordinator, told reporters. ‘But this shows how, with the increasing winds and low humidity, the fire has become very active again in several areas.’
The entire state remained a veritable tinderbox Friday, with scorching weather conditions; those conditions have helped spark 186 blazes in the last seven days, fire officials said.
On Thursday, weather officials announced that Texas had set a national record for summer heat, with an average temperature of 86.8 degrees from June 1 to Aug. 31. That bested a record Oklahoma set in 1934, during the Dust Bowl.
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--Ashley Powers in Bastrop, Texas
twitter.com/ashleypowers