Small Bush Fire

 Yesterday before our afternoon Tonga lesson Cory noticed smoke from a bush fire a short distance from our house.

"No problem, we know how to fight this if it gets too close" we were told.

It may have been started by someone wanting to hunt and push animals out of the tall grass.

So the first thing we did after class was to walk through the field south of our house.

In Haiti the livestock keep the grass short, so living surrounded by tall dry grass and plenty of trees that could burn is a new experience for us. 

The fire driven by afternoon winds was close to a mission fence, a few strands of barbwire strung on small dry branches. 

The last rains occurred in March so most of the grass is dead and dry, along with very low humidity, and about 80'F.

A few guys from the Bible college came to help with an ax and tree branches while Cory went for buckets of water.

The procedure as I watched is to cut a branch off a small tree or bush and use it to hit the edge of the fire, back toward the burnt area.

Most of the green leaves fell off the branches after the first 2-3 hits making this a fairly inefficient method.

The winds would kick up the fire impressively now and then causing the guys to jump back in alarm. 

Thankfully we had both electricity and water available to help douse the flames when they neared the fence. 

Other than to protect the fence and fruit trees in our yard, allowing the fire to burn off the dead underbrush only called for careful watching to make sure things didn't get out of control.

It would be worse if a fire occurred at night or when many people happened to be gone for some reason.

In a couple of hours the winds died down so the guys lit some back fires to help protect more of the fence.

We were never in danger but I must say that the sound of a roaring crackling fire still stimulated and highlighted one's understanding of how a big, out of control fire could be devastating. 

The leading edge of the fire burning away from us in the distance, with the wind was moving much faster than the part we fought which was burning into the wind.

The birds enjoyed feasting on many small grasshoppers and bugs driven out in front of the flames.

We didn't see any other animals.