Photos and video for NSBNEWS.net by Jeanette DiCara. At left, thick black smoke billows from the woods Sunday afternoon. Below left, an unidentified Edgewater police officer stands by on the perimeter while firefighters with a brush truck tackle the brush fire. A county helicopter, shown in the video, attacks the fire from the air. The smaller photo illustrates the thick underbrush that fueled the fire.
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EDGEWATER -- Sunday afternoon was a busy one for firefighters from Edgewater, New Smyrna Beach and Volusia County, fighting stubborn brush fires, one of which came within several hundred yards of an Edgewater subdivision, threatening at least a half dozen homes, but the fire was kept in check because of canals and a pond between it and the homes.
Several brush trucks and pumpers were used on the ground to fight the stubborn fire, fueled by thick underbrush while a county helicopter did its work from the air to douse the flames.
The first fire was reported at 12:44 p.m. at 3272 West State Road 40, resulting from a homeowner burning trash that got out of control and mushroomed to about one-quarter of an acre before Volusia firefighters were able to extinguish it, county spokeswoman Pat Kuehn reported.
The second fire at 12:50 p.m. on State Road 44 and Glencoe Road in New Smyrna Beach consumed three-quarters of an acre, but was put out in a matter of minutes. It was not near any homes.
The third fire about 2 p.m. near 27th and Evergreen streets in Edgewater was the largest at 5 acres and came within several hundred yards of one neighborhood before firefighters from Edgewater, the county and put it out before 4 p.m. with a land and aerial attack using a helicopter.
There were no reported injuries there as well.
The causes of the latter two fires are under investigation by the New Smyrna Beach and Edgewater fire marshals, respectively.