Ten departments join to fight wind-driven grass and brush fire north of Charles City Tuesday evening

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

Just about every fire department in the area was called to help fight a grass and brush fire Tuesday afternoon that a brisk wind was threatening to push into several houses in the 700 block of Shadow Avenue, about 2 miles north of the Charles City city limits.

Colwell and Floyd fire departments responded to passing motorists’ 911 reports of the fire a little before 5 p.m. and quickly began calling for extra firefighters to help battle the blaze and to ferry water from the nearest hydrants.

Responding to the scene in addition to Floyd and Colwell were the fire departments from Charles City, Rockford, Rudd, Nora Springs, Nashua, Ionia, New Hampton and Osage, bringing their arsenals of four-wheel drive units, portable water supplies, chainsaws, blowers and other equipment to push back the rural blaze.

The Charles City Fire Department reported that the fire started with an attended brush fire that grew out of control when fueled by winds greater than 20 mph out of the west and northwest. About six acres were burned in the incident.

Burning areas that had been doused with water and put out kept erupting in flames again as the wind blew glowing embers throughout the area.

Fire departments were working from staging areas in the yards of three homes directly in the line of the advancing fire.

“With help from numerous surrounding departments we were able to prevent the fire from impacting the nearby homes and stopped it from spreading across the road to additional CRP,” the Charles City Fire Department report said, referring to land in the Conservation Reserve Program.

A burn ban in Floyd County had been lifted last week after the area received some rain, but the Charles City Fire Rescue Facebook page had warned that people still needed “to make smart decisions.”

“Burning with 20-plus mph winds is not one of those smart decisions,” a CCFD post said in response to the Tuesday fire. “Just because there isn’t a burn ban doesn’t mean things still won’t burn,” it said.