It was all hands on deck as local, state and federal agencies responded to a large brush fire near the Starr County – Hidalgo County line Friday afternoon.
Nearly every fire department in Hidalgo County, as well as Rio Grande City and Alto Bonito in Starr County, the Texas A&M Forest Service, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service responded to the blaze, which sparked around lunchtime, according to Weslaco Fire Chief Antonio “Tony” Lopez.
The fire occurred near La Paloma just west of the Starr County line, prompting the forest service to dub it the La Paloma Fire.
At the height of the conflagration, the fire line had spread for a couple of miles east-to-west and north-to-south, engulfing an estimated 1,000 acres, Lopez said.
At least one structure and one vehicle caught fire, officials said. Fortunately, early reports indicate that no people have been harmed as a result of the blaze.
At one point, the fire forced the closure of the eastbound lanes of U.S. Highway 83, though the highway had been reopened by 5 p.m., when firefighters had been able to stop the progress of the fire.
“The forward movement of the fire has been stopped, and now they’re putting out everything everywhere,” Edinburg Fire Chief Shawn Snider said of the dozens of firefighters still on the scene.
Close to 100 firefighters responded to the blaze, Snider said, including a so-called “strike team” from the Texas A&M Forest Service, of which he is a part.
The forest service also deployed air assets to combat the blaze, including helicopters and planes that dropped water and fire retardant, Hidalgo County Emergency Management Coordinator Ricardo Saldaña said.
The wildfire prompted the activation of the Hidalgo County Wildland Taskforce, Lopez, the Weslaco chief, said.
That activation caused fire departments from as far away as Mercedes to respond with manpower and equipment.
The Weslaco Fire Department, as the only department with disaster-ready medical equipment, responded with its ambulance bus, or “ambus,” a passenger bus converted into a mass casualty ambulance capable of treating more than a dozen patients at a time.
Weslaco often uses the ambus to treat firefighters for smoke inhalation, dehydration and exhaustion at the scene of such blazes, Lopez has previously said.
Snider’s Edinburg Fire Department responded with a bulldozer to tackle the dry brush which had been acting as kindling throughout the afternoon.
“They are doing perimeter backburns and perimeter dozer breaks, what they call firebreaks, with bulldozers. So, we still have a good, active fire in progress, but containment, we’re getting the upper hand on it,” Lopez said, adding that the terrain had added to the difficulty of the fire response.
“It’s kind of like a small hill, but a lot of short brush, high grass. There… is a lot of caliche pits in that area. So it’s been a lot of ground that’s been mined, and it’s very uneven, so that’s what’s making it hard to get access, but that’s where the air assets came in through the forestry service,” Lopez said.
Approximately 45-50% of the fire had been contained as of 6:30 p.m., officials said.
Weather conditions on Friday likely exacerbated the fire, and several others which were reported throughout the region.
“Today is a red flag warning day. Any fire that is burning has a great, exceptional potential of exploding into a major fire, so we encourage everybody to focus on the weather conditions. Low humidity, high wind, dry grass equals disaster,” Snider said.
On Friday alone, Edinburg firefighters responded to half a dozen fires, Snider said, including one along Alamo Road that had threatened seven structures before crews got it under control.
“While we’re finishing that, I see smoke coming up not even a half a mile away and it’s people burning trash,” Snider said.
The longtime fire chief asked people to be aware of conditions prior to doing any burning, and to ensure they have the proper permits.
That will become increasingly important as the Rio Grande Valley — and the state as a whole — progresses further into fire season, Lopez said.
“We’re gonna be dealing with that here for the next couple of months,” Lopez said, pointing to factors such as tall, dry grass in the ranchlands which are ripe for sparking a fire.
“Right now, all Valley departments are on high alert. We’re here to support each other to combat these fires and not letting them get that big. But today, due to the wind and terrain and conditions and fuel, which is the grass, was the perfect condition to create a big monster fire,” Lopez said, referring to the La Paloma Fire.
