With 2016 'heavy' on the mind, people leave homes behind as Sevier County fires spread
On Day Two of the Hatcher Mountain Road/Indigo Lane Fire, efforts shifted from evacuation to containment after rainfall helped slow the spread of the blaze that erupted Wednesday in the popular Great Smoky Mountains retreat.
Sevier County Mayor Larry Waters said Thursday there have been no reports of fatalities or missing people. More than 200 people and 70 agencies have been involved in the firefighting efforts, and the fire was only 30% contained by Thursday afternoon.
'There's no waiting game on this one'
The sound of banjo picking filled a red brick courtyard just off the Pigeon Forge strip Thursday afternoon and, if it weren’t for the wildfire eating up nearby mountainside, it would seem like a normal day.
That brick courtyard belongs to the Pigeon Forge Community Center, where the American Red Cross set up a shelter for people evacuating the fire.
Numbers at the shelter ebbed and flowed as families checked to see if they could return to their homes. At its peak, the community center had 131 people taking shelter, said Jessica Fisher, a Red Cross disaster action responder.
People from the area worried about what they left behind — their homes, their mementos and pets — that couldn’t be found in the push to evacuate.
The fire reminded residents of the devastation from 2016, when walls of flames tore through Gatlinburg, killing 14 people and injuring 190. The 2016 wildfire was the deadliest in the eastern half of the U.S. since 1947 and burned more than 15 square miles over 30 days.
“The fear from the last time — that's heavy on everybody's mind," Fisher said. "So everybody's like, ‘Oh my goodness. We've got to go.’ There's no waiting game on this one. They were on it."
Fisher said the shelter saw vacationers from all over who had evacuated rental cabins. She expects more visitors at the shelter as different roads are shut down.
Managing hot spots on Thursday
Firefighters spent the majority of the day Thursday patrolling the perimeter and focusing on hot spots in an effort to keep the fire from getting any bigger, said Brook Smith, spokesperson for the Tennessee Division of Forestry.
Navigating the web of cabins in the area complicated mitigation efforts. Firefighters put in dozer lines to prevent fire spreading but have to weave through neighborhoods, making it more difficult to connect a dozer line through the entire fire footprint.
In the Little Valley neighborhood, rental cabins sit next to streaks of scorched earth. The fire burned through the top layer of leaf litter, leaving fuel on the ground that could be reignited.
This is why firefighters spent Thursday doing targeted mitigation; many areas could flame back up as the wind carries embers from still smoking “hot spots.”
Hot spots are logs and stumps that hold heat and can spread sparks. Firefighters call these 100-hour fuels because they can burn for a long time. Nathan Waters, spokesperson for the state's forestry division, said the 100-hour logs had a 13% moisture content, making them extra susceptible to a fire.
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'There was no stopping it'
Perry Suttles evacuated from the Dupont area around 11 p.m. Wednesday, dogs in tow.
"My neighbor came down the hill and said, 'Perry, you've got to get out of the holler, everything's burning,'" Suttles said. "So I loaded the dogs up. I tried to catch the goat; I couldn't catch the goat."
Suttles said he spent the night at a shelter in Seymour and had been unable to return to his home due to evacuation orders.
"I've never seen anything like this," he said. "I mean, that wind was coming across the mountains there at 50 to 60 miles per hour. There was no stopping it."
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'There's still a risk'
The Hatcher Mountain/Indigo Lane fire has affected 3,700 acres, which doesn’t include the Gatlinburg fires and spot fires across the county. Five firefighting vehicles were damaged.
Larry Waters said 11,000 homes had been evacuated from Wednesday morning through Thursday morning.
“I think the worst is over, but I think there's still a risk," he said.
Two firefighters suffered minor injuries and were treated at the scene. Another person operating a bulldozer was injured Wednesday and was flown out by LifeStar. There was no update on his condition Thursday morning.
The cause of the fire is still undetermined. At least 100 structures were impacted, and evacuations continue to be in place.
The Mountain Tough nonprofit, which was founded to distribute aid to victims of the 2016 Sevier County wildfires, is being reactivated after shutting down in 2018.
Sevier County has created a dynamic map of the current fire evacuation area that can be found on the Sevier County Emergency Management Agency Facebook page at facebook.com/SevierCoEMA.
Users can type their address in the window to see if they are within the evacuation area.
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Sevier County, Wears Valley fire: firefighters continue to fight fires
