Its almost the weekend...thank God!
Mood:  on fire
We did our big 30 acre burn yesterday and things went fairly well all things considering. We had a couple of tense moments. The wind was very low yesterday which made the fire burn too slow. So we had to run strips of fire through the area with a drip torch. We all took turns and when it came time for me to run a line, I ended up in the thickest section on the plot. At one point I got entangled in a mess of vines, briar, and sweet gum trees. Here I stood caught with no way out and a drip torch dipping fire all around me. I looked over to my right and saw the last line that had been lit moving rapidly towards me. I had to do something fast or I would be overcome with fire. I blew out my torch and threw it as far ahead of me as I could. I then put on my gloves, covered my face with my handkerchief, pulled my goggles down over my eyes, and started to plow my way out of the briar. I could feel the briar tearing at my skin and blood starting to trickling down my leg. I didn't care. I would rather have a few scratches than burn to death. I emerged from the thicket and I was finally free. I picked up my torch and ran straight for the fire line. I reached it just as the fire had caught up with me. Close call. What a way to get the heart pumping. The others on the line came running over. Apparently they had tried to call me on the radio to see if I was alright and when I didn't answer they feared the worst. In all the excitement of trying to get out I didn't even hear them call. I went over to the fire truck and cleaned up my wounds and ate my lunch. It took awhile for my heart to stop racing.

I went back out to the line. This time instead of running more strips through the thick area they decided to run a chevron shape line close to the fireline. Which worked great. The only draw back to this was that it made the fire run hot and quick. There was a dead snag right on the fireline that was burning fast and was throwing off bits of flaming bark across the line, into a section we didn't want to burn. We had about 3 spot fires that had to be dealt with.

Towards the end of the burn we had a couple of trees falls over the line and some hot spots that had to be dealt with. At one point we had taken the fire truck down the fireline to put out a tree that was on fire and then couldn't get the truck out. LOL We ended up having to cut down some small saplings in order to be able to turn the truck around. It was pretty funny.

We finished everything up by 5 o'clock and headed back to the office to store everything and go home. I was EXHAUSTED. It was all I could do to stay awake to watch LOST. I woke up this morning, sore from my shoulders to my feet. I NEED A MASSAGE!!!! I hurt in places i didn't know I had.

It was a good experience but I am glad it is over with.