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Wednesday, December 15, 2010

No More Raking! :)

Last week we had a small wildfire experience in our backyard. Ee heh.
It all started right after Mom left for work. Soon after, I was emptying the coals/ashes from our wood stove, as it had gotten enormously full. I put them in the ash pile outside, and observed that they were smoking a bit.
I thought, no problem, coals do that all the time. So I went inside.
About a half an hour later, Betsey and John left to go to a friends house for a party. (John was a guest, and Betsey was babysitting.)
And another half hour later, Chrissy looked outside the doors leading to the deck, and said, "Brittany, the backyard's on fire!"
"Chrissy, it's just the coals from the ash pile, nothing to worry about." I said,
"No seriously, the backyard is ON FIRE!!!"
Reluctantly, I got up from my school, and looked outside. Sure enough, the backyard was enveloped in smoke, and flames were licking at the leaves ten feet away from the propane tank. I went outside to survey the damage, and immediately called the neighbors, who came over with a 100-foot hose, and a ton of shovels. At first the fire seemed to be beating us, and calling the fire department was a very good option, but then at the last moment, we finally got it out.
The neighbors told Chrissy and I to stay on the deck until it got dark, to keep an eye on all the spots where it might re-start. So, we stayed on the deck watching Phineas & Ferb on Mom's computer, until the sun went down. There were a couple of times when we needed to spray a log or two, but other than that, all was quiet.


The area of damage.

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