Dumas fire now contained
AMARILLO, TEXAS -- UPDATE: Pronews 7 spoke with the Texas Forest Service Friday morning, and we're told that a helicopter fly-over will be done to determine the acreage that was burned in Thursday's fire.
UPDATE:
The grass fire just southeast of Dumas is now contained. It burned between 2,000 and 2,500 acres. Fire crews tell us it started near highway 287 on the Coon Ranch, then headed east with the help of high winds.
But it's not just the winds that were giving crews trouble, in addition, many vehicles were getting stuck in the sandy terrain and others were breaking down.
At first firefighters said the winds were traveling too fast for the crews to keep up with it, but now that they've died down fire crews were able to fight the front of the fire.
"With the winds, a good way to of putting this fire out is with a maintainer, cutting a line and cutting the grass away from it," said Billy Touchstone, a Dumas firefighter.
We spoke with Rowdy Rhodes, the County Judge in Dumas. He said fire crews will be working through the night to make sure the fire doesn't spark again.
Homes on Lew Haile road that were threatened are safe thanks to the fire fighters, but an old bunker house on Sneed Ranch did suffer damage.
PREVIOUSLY POSTED:
Pronews 7 has learned that fire crews are battling a wildfire on the Coon Ranch southeast of Dumas. The Moore County Sheriff's department tells us that the fire started about 3:30p.m., and is moving northeast.
We're told that so far no buildings have been threatened.
