Members of local fire and rescue squads were busy last week, working to extinguish a number of brush fires that broke out across the area. The incidents have prompted local fire chiefs to remind residents that conditions are dry and the possibility of a controlled burn getting out of control is heightened.

Members of the Abingdon Volunteer Fire and Rescue Inc. and the Virginia Department of Forestry responded to a 100-plus acre burn last Thursday just off Zack Road at Hayes. VDOF technician Nelson Jarvis said the fire, which is still under investigation, consumed about 80-90 acres of marshland and about 30 acres of adjoining woodland.

This fire, he said only threatened one structure, but Jarvis plowed an area around the structure to help keep the fire from spreading too close to it.

Shortly after firefighters were released from that blaze, the Gloucester Volunteer Fire and Rescue Squad, Inc., responded to another brush fire off Nelson Wood Lane in Naxera that threatened several stru...