The White River fire showed no signs of relenting

WHITE RIVER – The persistent plantation blaze flared up again at three places on Avalon Farms after it had been 95 per cent contained at 11:00 on Sunday.

“Yesterday we had six fires, but this one got away. The blaze is fuelled by the combustible vegetation, a strong south-eastern wind and constant high temperatures,” said Vaughn Lascelles, chairman of the Lowveld and Escarpment Fire Protection Association (Lefpa).

According to Lascelles, the fire originated from plantation slash-burning by the South African Forestry Company Limited. Lefpa had warned all members that it was not advisable to burn during the current prevailing weather conditions and sweltering heatwave.

“Today we have three water-bomber planes, as we have sourced one plane from eMkhondo (formerly Piet Retief) to help with the effort of dowsing the smouldering fire that destroyed pine and bluegum trees over an area approximately seven to eight hectares,” Lascelles said.

He and about 100 men and women worked in shifts throughout the night to extinguish the uncontrollable blaze.

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As fire season usually ends in the middle of November in the Lowveld area, there was only skeleton staff available to assist in the firefighting effort. “This is an indication of climate change. In the past we only had one or two small fires during December, but never such a massive fire,” Lascelles said.

The water bombers, which filled up at the Rutland Airstrip reservoir, stood down briefly at 10:30 on Sunday after an area on Gradely Farms, that had still been burning, was contained. Lowvelder was told about a water shortage at the airstrip on Saturday, which hampered the firefighting endeavour.

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“Fortunately the tankers are filling up the reservoir and we are currently standing on 30 000 litres,” Lascelles said.

Lascelles stated that people misread the situation.

“It is a payday weekend and there are not many people on standby. Luckily we trained the guys from the Off-road Rescue Unit Lowveld at the beginning of the year to load the planes as backup in case of an emergency like this one,” he said.

With the cinders burning and the fire smouldering in the background, a nearby macadamia farmer, Craig Hearne, and his friend Matt Colman assisted in trying to control the blazing fire.

“It is so hard to kill the fire when it gets into the pine needles. You spray it and then it just ignites again,” Colman said.

Hearne described how he saw a frightened bushbuck that came running out of the bush to the escape the smoke-laden air.

Lascelles confirmed that their biggest challenges thus far are fencing put up by farmers, which restricts their access, and the availability of staff.

The fire was contained late on Sunday afternoon, according to Lefpa. It requested all members of the various industries to take all necessary precautions, as the hot and dry conditions are likely to continue for most of the week. No burning permits will be issued henceforth until further notice.