Clapshaw Hill Road brush fire consumes single acre as Forest Grove's first brush fire of the wildfire season

Earlier today we blogged about the new Brush Rigs that had recently went into service for our wildfire season.  So far this year wildfire season in our part of NW Oregon had been relatively quiet, that all changed this afternoon however as we had our first significant brush fire of the year when just over one acre of grass and brush burned on NW Clapshaw Hill Road.  When firefighters arrived just after 2 pm today they found the fire burning on an open piece of property on NW Clapshaw Hill Road near the community of Kansas City in the Forest Grove Rural Fire Protection District.  The new Brush Rig 418 from the Forest Grove Fire Station was quickly put to work along other brush rigs from Forest Grove, Banks, and Cornelius and firefighters were able to get a quick stop made that kept the fire under control at around one acre.  Fire Investigators believe that the fire started as a result of an unattended burn pile on the property, and this is a potentially tragic reminder that burning is closed right now and you should take a few minutes to check your old burn piles to prevent this type of incident from occurring again.  For a short time, two small barns on the property were threatened as flames burned in the waist high grass within 200 feet of the barns.  A Heavy Brush Rig from the Forest Grove Fire Station was quickly deployed to this area and controlled the fire before it could damage any of the buildings on the property.  Though fire crews had the fire under control relatively quickly, a crew remained on scene until 4:00 pm to check for hot spots and make sure that the fire was indeed out.  Burn piles are one of the prevalent causes of fires in our area, please take a few minutes and make sure your spring burn piles are out by thoroughly soaking them one more time with water and stirring them  with a shovel, even a suspected dormant burn pile can remain hot deep down for weeks or months after you think they are out.