A brush fire burned around 100 acres of marshland Sunday night on Jenkins Neck Road in lower Gloucester.
Abingdon Volunteer Fire and Rescue Squad Chief Brad Burgess said the fire began sometime around 7:30 p.m. not far from the intersection of Jenkins Neck and Owens roads and traveled in the brush along the creek line, venturing into a stand of trees here and there, where it tended to die down.
Burgess said as he approached the scene, he saw an orange glow in the sky, indicating substantial fire. There were already units on the scene, he said, and he coordinated with them to develop a strategy to protect any homes that might be in the fire line, since there was no way to access the fire in the marsh. Their only option was to try to predict what it might do and stay ahead of it, so they strategically placed engines, brush trucks, and tankers near homes along the three roads that the fire might impact as it moved, and waited for it to come to them.
The strategy proved successful, with no...