SPANAWAY, Wash. — Fire raced through an unused sawmill in Pierce County, sending flames and thick black smoke into the air.
Firefighters say the flames were fanned by the hot, dry conditions all around the region.
The National Weather Service issued a red flag warning for the West Slopes of the Cascades -- above 1,500 feet.
But firefighters say the hot, dry conditions in the lowlands are ripe for fire, too, as evidenced by the sawmill that went up in flames in Spanaway this morning.
It took hours for firefighters to put that fire out.
Smoke was still coming from the ruins. Firefighters were still pouring water on this sawmill when we arrived at about 1 this Wednesday afternoon.
But it took 20 rigs from West, Central and South Pierce fire to get this one under control.
These are the fiery images Aluna Lemaitre captured as she arrived at work this Wednesday morning.
“It was smoldering,” she said. “I thought I was mistaken from afar and it was like a big bonfire. But this is like the worst weather to have a bonfire.”
But perfect conditions, say firefighters, for a fire to break out just about anywhere in Pierce County.
Is the weather a factor?
“Absolutely, absolutely,” said Battalion Chief Jared Bonea with Central Pierce Fire. “We’ve been in a drought for some months now. That continues to trend. Our temperature index is much higher than it has been historically. And the relative humidity continues to drop. So, these can create very dramatic explosive fire conditions. Both in the wildland settings and the residential commercial settings.”
As for this fire, Bonea says it took but a glance for firefighters to write off saving this unused sawmill East of the Roy Y on Mountain Highway East in Spanaway.
“We knew that this was a hundred percent loss,” said Bonea. “The amount of fire, the amount of smoke was so tremendous, it wouldn’t have mattered what kind of resources we had. It would not have been able to be extinguished.”
It gave little comfort to Aluna Lemaitre who works at a hair salon across the street.
“We were worried about it spreading,” she said. “But there wasn’t a lot of ash, mostly smoke.”
The cause of this fire still has not been determined, but the building is considered a total loss.
The good news is there were two workers on the scene when the fire started. No one was hurt.
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