Mind the wind, avoid buildings: Ainsworth fire chief

AINSWORTH — After two fire calls in as many days over the holiday weekend, Ainsworth Fire Chief Waylon Schultz is urging community members to account for wind and stay clear of buildings when they conduct controlled burns of any scale.

Both structure fires happened when formerly controlled burns got out of hand. The first, the night of March 30, required volunteers to extinguish an unoccupied hog building along Old White Way. The other involved a porch fire on Easter morning, March 31.

“Firefighters from our town and the other three departments that responded, they were all getting ready for family activities that day, but they donate their time and efforts to their communities,” Schultz said. “(They) pulled together that morning, getting it handled, even though it was a holiday.”

Schultz said the hog building caught fire when a controlled burn on Conservation Reserve Program land blew off course.

Police reports from the incident said a caller had asked for help “in case the fire gets too close,” but that first responders found the building ablaze when they arrived.

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“(Fire) makes its own wind, is how we say it, it creates a lot of breeze coming into it because it’s sucking oxygen in,” Schultz said. “The best thing to do is make sure you have a path mowed or plowed around it, and always back-burn away from the wind, and then back into the wind so it doesn’t create a big push of fire.”

As for the Sunday incident, the fire chief said someone at the home had burned off dead shrubs within a few feet of the house the night before. That evening, the embers found enough oxygen to spread, ultimately igniting the house’s entire front porch.

Schultz said the house wasn’t a total loss, but had suffered heavy internal smoke and water damage, along with the fire damage on the outside. He urges other homeowners to learn from the emergency, and avoid burning anything within 20-30 feet of a building, as a rule of thumb.

“When stuff’s that close to the house, it’s never a good idea to burn those off,” he said. “It’s always better to either cut those flowers off or take them away from the house or dig them up, so they’re not there, and burn them in a remote location.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com