TOWN OF GARDNER, Wis.— Dry vegetation and windy conditions were the perfect conditions for a small fire to rapidly spread in Door County during the afternoon of October 28th.
Dispatchers were called just after 3p.m. to County Road C just west of the Town of Gardner where a massive brush fire was burning through acres of land.
Assistant Fire Chief of the Brussels-Union-Gardner fire department Jim Wautier says the blaze was unlike anything he experienced before.
“This had to of been the largest grass fire we ever dealt with. We never have had anything of this size before,” said Wautier. “Thankfully we had 19 other fire departments that came to our assistance from four different counties. Overall we had about 140 firefighters battling this blaze. We had to pull out at around 7:30p.m. for the safety of our firefighters. We did not want our guys to be caught under 40 foot tall trees that were burning and at risk of falling.”
Several fire crews were able to contain the fire the morning of October 29th, but Wautier reports that there were flames as tall as 18 feet in some places of the blaze.
In all, 70 acres of land were destroyed but no one was hurt in the incident.
Wautier says the fire was started by an ATV not properly starting and it resulted in local brush to catch fire and grow at an explosive rate.
