Four-Alarm Fire Burns Along Egg Lake
Neighbors Count Their Blessings After Blaze
HUGO - It's the last place one would expect to see a raging fire - running along the cattails of a lake shoreline in spring.
But one Hugo homeowner learned the hard way that DNR burning bans are to be taken seriously. An outdoor fire lit in a fire pit on the shore of Egg Lake to burn a pile of poison sumac branch trimmings threw a spark into the cattails a few feet away.
PHOTO BY DEB BARNES
Flames raced through the tinderdry vegetation.
"I went into the water but I couldn't contain it," she said mournfully after firefighters from the Hugo and Forest Lake fire departments, and the Department of Natural Resources' Metro Fire Crew had doused the flames and CityNewswere waiting for Forest Lake's air boat to reach the site.
The 911 call came in just before 7 p.m. on April 23. According to Hugo Fire Chief Jim Compton, the DNR was called in right away.
"When we got [to the home on Fountain Avenue], it was probably a 200-foot fire line burning out into the cattails that we couldn't hit . that's when I called for a helicopter, and that wasn't available," Compton said. "I called for an aircraft to do a belly scoop on the lake, and because of the sunset, they couldn't get off the ground - it was too late in the day."
Forest Lake Fire was called to assist: Hugo and a number of surrounding cities have mutual aid agreements wherein they agree to help each other in times of need. The White Bear Lake Fire Department manned the Hugo Fire Station as a precaution, Compton said, as all of Hugo's manpower and resources were dedicated to the Egg Lake fire.
Firefighters did what they could; the flames were several hundred feet east of Fountain Avenue in areas that were inaccessible to the pumper.
One cattail area burnt out to the edge of the dry vegetation and put itself out in the water; Compton said firefighters were able to find a way to walk out to the other burning area with waterpacks and hand lines.
"They were able to get one hose line on the south end of the fire," he said.
While firefighters were quelling the flames, Forest Lake's air boat was launched from public property north of the old Antique Store along Highway 61 and made its way south.
The air boat is normally used for ice rescue, but "we can use it for anything," Forest Lake Fire Captain J. Harris said.
In this case, he said, the boat was used to cool down the hot vegetation: the flat-bottomed boat pushed still-smoldering cattails down into the water.
After it was all over, the neighbors counted their blessings.
"At least nobody's house caught on fire," said Marge Danhoff. "And nobody was hurt." That said, however, Marge and her husband, aren't sure about Gus and Matilda, the pair of ducks that nest in the cattails behind their house every spring. "I don't know if they made it," she said.
Hugo firefighters counted their blessings, too, not the least of which was the free pizza awaiting them at the Hugo Fire Hall, courtesy of Wise Guys Pizza in Centerville. Compton recalled that the last time the HFD fought a cattail fire was on the north end of Bald Eagle Lake on Easter Sunday "back in the 80s," he recalled. "That was almost a 12-hour fire."
The homeowner was issued citations by the DNR and Washington County Sheriff's Department.
Most spring wildfires originate from the burning of yard debris at home, when vegetati on is extremely dry. The DNR instituted its spring open burning restrictions on Monday, April 14. Homeowners can go to www.dnr.state.mn.us/forestry/fire/index.html for a map of fire restriction areas and more information.