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While walking the dog, I witnessed yesterday evening how easily a forest fire can start: frightening!
A caterpillar-track digger was working in a patch of scrubland (maquis) in the forest behind our house, preparing the way for a new water pipeline. The digging bucket must have hit a rock that generated a spark. Within one second the scrub was ablaze with flames at least 1 m high and covering about 2 m² of land. Fortunately, the nearest tree was a few m distant and the driver immediately dug up a bucketful of earth which he dumped on the advancing flames and then a second bucketful on the area where it started. He then tamped the deposited earth down with the bottom of the bucket.
The whole incident started and was over in about 20 seconds, but the speed with which the flames propagated in the first 5 seconds was impressive and frightening. I presume that this kind of thing was not unusual, judging from the presence of mind and reactions of the driver. If it had not been controlled so rapidly, the consequences could have been catastrophic as there were several properties within a radius of 100 m.
It just goes to show how easily a fire can start and how fast it can propagate.
A caterpillar-track digger was working in a patch of scrubland (maquis) in the forest behind our house, preparing the way for a new water pipeline. The digging bucket must have hit a rock that generated a spark. Within one second the scrub was ablaze with flames at least 1 m high and covering about 2 m² of land. Fortunately, the nearest tree was a few m distant and the driver immediately dug up a bucketful of earth which he dumped on the advancing flames and then a second bucketful on the area where it started. He then tamped the deposited earth down with the bottom of the bucket.
The whole incident started and was over in about 20 seconds, but the speed with which the flames propagated in the first 5 seconds was impressive and frightening. I presume that this kind of thing was not unusual, judging from the presence of mind and reactions of the driver. If it had not been controlled so rapidly, the consequences could have been catastrophic as there were several properties within a radius of 100 m.
It just goes to show how easily a fire can start and how fast it can propagate.