Davie
Well-Known Member
Had a very scary night last night. Fire was 3 miles from the house and less than 1/2 mile from Pat Elder's (Rosa Roca) training center and Leesa Conley's (not forum member). I took my stock trailer and big gooseneck and staged at Leesa's. Pat had her gooseneck ready at her place and Leesa had her trailer ready to go.
Was up until 1:00 making sure all was well as the winds were turning to blowing South SE and had been blowing West NW so fires could have jumped back over themselves and still gusting over 50mph at times.
The young man that works for me is a volunteer fireman but is currently not working as he is recovering from a boken leg so he was able to go up to the fire staging area and keep us posted on the SE 134th & Anderson Rd fire.
Someone asked about Amber Oaks--Bev M now lives in Springtown TX but her old place just miss the fire line by about a mile. I called her last night and she asked me to go by and make sure the place of OK.
One thing we realized and is a GOOD REMINDER FOR EVERYONE is we did not have enough halters of the right sizes for all the horses. As you know those things grow feet and walk away in the dark of night. So before you get caught in an evacuation situation, be sure that you have enough halters and leads. Better to have too many hanging around then not enough.
One of Pat's Shetland clients had to evacuate and they managed to take all the birds (they raise exotic parrots and cockatials (sp)) and the dogs but were not allowed back in to get the horses. They got back this morning--horses are fine, their house was untouched but the building that housed the birds was destroyed so now they are looking for a place to keep the birds until they can get a new building for them.
Did take a drive down on 134th on the way to work and most everyone from Draper Lake Drive to Hiawassee (about 2 miles) on the south side of the road had sever damage or total losses. The folks on the north side of the street faired a little better, mostly grass and some outbuilding. When I went back down 134th towards the lake and around toward the dam I found the point of origin for this fire--SOME STUPID PERSON THREW SOME IGNITION SOURCE out of their car and it caught the grass on fire under the big electrical transmission tower and it took off from there.
We also heard reports from Dustin's Fire Department scanner that several reports from 3 different staging areas in the Choctaw area fire had seen a group of 3 trucks pulling horse trailers thowing out lit toilet paper rolls along the roadside. We wondered why the fires were jumping 1/2 mile intervals. We were all about ready to YOU CAN GUESS!!! We just knew that if we had to haul out that every horse trailer was going to be stopped as they had no descriptions of the trucks.
This morning the smell of smoke at my house was extremely noticeable and when I drove up to check on Bev M's old place you could see the smoke right down on the ground and about 2 feet thick and just heavy in the air. They still had a firetruck down on 134th watching a lot of hot spots and our electric co-op was out replacing burned power poles. The Choctaw area fire is still not contained from what I heard on the news this morning.
The wind is not as bad this morning but would be nice if that rain the are prediction for Sunday would arrive today. Our fight fighters are just exhausted and are being rotated in and out but are stretched so thin with all the fires in the state much less the metro area.
Was up until 1:00 making sure all was well as the winds were turning to blowing South SE and had been blowing West NW so fires could have jumped back over themselves and still gusting over 50mph at times.
The young man that works for me is a volunteer fireman but is currently not working as he is recovering from a boken leg so he was able to go up to the fire staging area and keep us posted on the SE 134th & Anderson Rd fire.
Someone asked about Amber Oaks--Bev M now lives in Springtown TX but her old place just miss the fire line by about a mile. I called her last night and she asked me to go by and make sure the place of OK.
One thing we realized and is a GOOD REMINDER FOR EVERYONE is we did not have enough halters of the right sizes for all the horses. As you know those things grow feet and walk away in the dark of night. So before you get caught in an evacuation situation, be sure that you have enough halters and leads. Better to have too many hanging around then not enough.
One of Pat's Shetland clients had to evacuate and they managed to take all the birds (they raise exotic parrots and cockatials (sp)) and the dogs but were not allowed back in to get the horses. They got back this morning--horses are fine, their house was untouched but the building that housed the birds was destroyed so now they are looking for a place to keep the birds until they can get a new building for them.
Did take a drive down on 134th on the way to work and most everyone from Draper Lake Drive to Hiawassee (about 2 miles) on the south side of the road had sever damage or total losses. The folks on the north side of the street faired a little better, mostly grass and some outbuilding. When I went back down 134th towards the lake and around toward the dam I found the point of origin for this fire--SOME STUPID PERSON THREW SOME IGNITION SOURCE out of their car and it caught the grass on fire under the big electrical transmission tower and it took off from there.
We also heard reports from Dustin's Fire Department scanner that several reports from 3 different staging areas in the Choctaw area fire had seen a group of 3 trucks pulling horse trailers thowing out lit toilet paper rolls along the roadside. We wondered why the fires were jumping 1/2 mile intervals. We were all about ready to YOU CAN GUESS!!! We just knew that if we had to haul out that every horse trailer was going to be stopped as they had no descriptions of the trucks.
This morning the smell of smoke at my house was extremely noticeable and when I drove up to check on Bev M's old place you could see the smoke right down on the ground and about 2 feet thick and just heavy in the air. They still had a firetruck down on 134th watching a lot of hot spots and our electric co-op was out replacing burned power poles. The Choctaw area fire is still not contained from what I heard on the news this morning.
The wind is not as bad this morning but would be nice if that rain the are prediction for Sunday would arrive today. Our fight fighters are just exhausted and are being rotated in and out but are stretched so thin with all the fires in the state much less the metro area.
Last edited by a moderator:
OH!
