Huge wildfire has burned almost unnoticed for months

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Posted 8:02AM on Monday, June 24, 2002

ALBANY - While wildfires have been raging across the West, burning scores of homes and forcing thousands of evacuations, fires just as large have been blazing for three months in southeast Georgia's Okefenokee Swamp, almost unnoticed except for layers of smoke drifting over Florida, Alabama and South Carolina. The Blackjack Bay Complex fires, still burning in the heart of the 396,000-acre Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge, have blackened more than 124,000 acres since March about 13,000 less than the West's largest fire, the 137,000-acre Hayman fire south of Denver. The first of the Bay Complex fires started in March following a prescribed burn. Efforts by the refuge staff, the Georgia Forestry Commission and private landowners prevented it from spreading to private timberland. The second was discovered in late April and the third, in early May. Both are believed to have been caused by lightning. Unlike the Hayman fire, which forced 8,900 evacuations and destroyed 79 homes, the Blackjack fires have been confined mostly to the uninhabited swamp. Periodic fires are necessary to maintain the Okefenokee's ecosystem, otherwise it would turn into a forest bog. But they would be devastating if they spread to nearby communities, or to the 2 million acres of commercial timberland that surrounds the swamp. At times, the wildfires resembled some of the Western infernos. Wind swept the blaze across the tinder-dry swamp, sending flames into the tops of 80-foot cypress and pine trees. At other times, rain doused the flames, but the fires continued to burn and smolder below the surface in thick layers of peat moss. With the swamp in its fifth year of drought, the peat and vegetation is highly combustible. Dark smoke from the fires billowed high above the swamp and drifted for up to 150 miles. At one time, there were as many as 300 firefighters assigned to the Okefenokee fires, including equipment and manpower dispatched by the federal government, the Georgia Forestry Commission, the Florida Division of Forestry and by private landowners, said Jim Burkhard, a refuge ranger. With recent rain, the flames have somewhat subsided and officials have reduced the force. Okefenokee-area landowners joined with federal and state officials in a major wildfire initiative following a 1989 fire that strained government and private resources. They formed a group known as the Greater Okefenokee Association of Landowners that includes representatives of major timber companies, the Interior Department, the U.S. Forest Service and the state forest agencies. Since it's dangerous to send firefighters into the swamp and heavy equipment is useless, swamp fires are fought from the uplands surrounding the Okefenokee. During the 1990s, the association cleared a 20-to-150-foot-wide firebreak stretching for about 250 miles around the circumference of the swamp. Workers dug 52 dip sites around the swamp, where helicopters could go for water to dump on fires. They put up street signs to help firefighters navigate the many logging roads that wind through the remote area. They developed a special map for firefighters, and they shared radio frequencies and mobile phone numbers for emergency communications. Wesley Langdale, vice president of woodlands for the Langdale Co., a Valdosta-based timber company, said the partnership has proven extremely helpful. His company is a member. ``The lightning is going to strike and the swamp is going to catch on fire,'' he said. ``Doesn't it make more sense to get to know your neighbors before ... everyone is freaking out.'' Members of the association meet periodically to discuss swamp issues. ``Everybody communicates, everybody is on the same page,'' Langdale said. ''... When there's a fire, it's everybody's common goal to put the fire out. The fire is going to burn in the swamp. Everybody is trying to protect their resources, be it their homes, or their timberland and people's economic livelihood.'' Alan Dozier, the Georgia Forestry Commission's top firefighter, said protecting the communities around the swamp Fargo, St. George and Folkston, in Georgia, and Baxter and Malone, Fla. is the top priority. ``We have communities outside the Okefenokee ... that we've been worried about, but with planning and preparedness, we've been able to keep the fires out,'' he said. ``Our success has kept them from being threatened like the ones out West.'' Dozier said the Okefenokee partnership could serve as a model for other parts of the country. ``What people don't know is that we put a lot of time and effort into these Okefenokee fires,'' Dozier said. ``From the onset we've been there with manpower and equipment. We've installed firebreaks, but we've been lucky enough to be ahead of the curve. Instead of the fire dictating what we do everyday, we planned ahead.''