<p>Wildfire spread rapidly Tuesday through the Okefenokee Swamp, fueled by dense and dry trees and brush, and firefighters tried to contain the blaze before it could spread onto private land in southeast Georgia.</p><p>The swamp fire, less than 10 miles southeast of Waycross, sent up a towering cloud of smoke near the entrance to the private, nonprofit Okefenokee Swamp Park. Wildfires have burned 53,000 acres, or about 67 square miles, of forest parched by drought here in the past eight days.</p><p>Byron Haire, a spokesman for the Georgia Forestry Commission, said the fire appeared to be moving eastward away from Waycross, a city of 15,300 people.</p><p>"This is a serious matter in that it's moving. It's a full-blown wildfire," Haire said Tuesday evening. "The concern is that the swamp-edge (fire) break won't hold it."</p><p>The fire started April 16 when a downed power line ignited tinder-dry trees in Ware County, part of a large area of southeast Georgia parched by severe drought. Officials said Tuesday the blaze was 50 percent contained by fire breaks plowed along its perimeter.</p><p>But winds have kept shifting direction over the past week, threatening to cause pockets of smoldering embers to flare back to life.</p><p>Ware County residents who have watched firefighters keep the blaze from their homes are keeping a nervous watch.</p><p>"A fire this size, a hot spot could flare up at any time. It's going to take a lot of rain to get it down," said Alan Davis, a 57-year-old sound technician who lives in Manor, a tiny community of 500 people 15 miles southwest of Waycross.</p><p>Davis and his wife, Laura Davis, on Monday finally took down the sprinkler that sprayed water across their roof for days while a wildfire raged through pine forest less than a mile from their home.</p><p>But they kept the bedsheet, anchored at the corners by flower pots, atop their house with its spray-painted sign: a big red bullseye and the words "Water Here!!!"</p><p>The thick, blinding smoke had mostly cleared from Manor on Tuesday after days of choking the unincorporated town. Firefighters said the fire had largely been contained behind fire breaks plowed by bulldozers a few miles to the south and east.</p><p>Still, the Davises kept their china packed in a plastic container on the porch and their framed wedding and graduation photos in boxes. The fire that has burned 53,000 acres, or about 67 square miles, over the past eight days was still going _ making it too early to feel safe.</p><p>About 50 evacuated residents were still unable to return Tuesday to their homes down Suwannee Church Road, where firefighters battled brush fires popping up ahead of the blaze.</p><p>Ware County sheriff's deputy Dearin Drury sat in his patrol car next to orange barrels blocking the road, politely turning residents away.</p><p>"Every 45 minutes o so I get one coming up," Drury said. "You can understand that. They're eager to get back to their homes."</p>
