DATE: Wednesday, July 16, 1997              TAG: 9707160468
SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   50 lines

BRUSH FIRES TAKE TOLL, EVEN ON PATIO PLANTS

It was hot enough Tuesday to help a brush fire start on a patio on the sixth floor of the World Trade Center.

A worker's acetylene torch ignited some potted junipers, setting off an alarm that eventually brought seven fire trucks to the scene.

Downtown traffic was clogged for about 20 minutes where Waterside Drive meets East Main Street in an oddly urban example of what happens when bone-dry vegetation ignites, said Jack Goldhorn of the Norfolk Fire Department.

Wildfires from last week still burn in the Great Dismal Swamp, and over the Fourth of July weekend, a few acres of farmland burned in Pungo.

Just over 14 inches of rain have fallen this year, according to the National Weather Service in Wakefield. That's 10 inches lower than average. For May, June and July, the region is 6.65 inches below the average rainfall.

``It has been most severe over the last couple of months,'' forecaster Scott Valone said. ``It doesn't look like there will be much or any rainfall for the remainder of the week. . . . I'm not real hopeful for any sort of rain in the following week either.''

Suffolk, where three wildfires have been controlled but still burn at the Dismal Swamp, has had a ban on outdoor burning for the past two weeks.

``It's horrible,'' Cindy Britton, the assistant refuge manager for the swamp, said of the weather. ``There's a lot of concern about water levels in the ditches right now.''

Vegetation fires can be started by lightning strikes or when a car with an overheated converter is parked in long grass, Goldhorn said. Other common causes include hot coals dumped after cookouts and unextinguished cigarette butts flicked into the grass.

Sparks from passing trains are also a concern. At a wheat field off Mount Pleasant Road in Chesapeake, a passing train is believed to have caused a fire a few weeks ago, according to Chesapeake Fire Marshal Thomas H. Cooke.

Unlike Suffolk, Chesapeake has not yet banned outdoor burning, though the city has had several minor brush fires.

``We've had some problems, but there's no ban yet,'' Cooke said. ``If (the dryness and heat) continue on, I'm sure we'll be looking at stopping all burning.''

Open burning is not allowed in Norfolk, Portsmouth or Virginia Beach - not even for agricultural purposes in areas such as Pungo, though farmers there may obtain permits by contacting the fire marshal's office. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

STEVE EARLEY/The Virginian-Pilot

Dave Brownlie, fire management officer at the Great Dismal Swamp

refuge, examines a spot where a recent brush fire flared up.

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