Fire
No-one wants to see this—especially when the corn is dry enough to pick and the woods are full of fallen dry leaves—and then there is a piece of very expensive machinery that is destroyed. But the farmer escaped totally unharmed—and the volunteer fire department raced to the fire and very quickly got the situation in control.
We were in our farm house, mending a hole in the floor with salvaged floor boards when we saw the plume of smoke over the hill. Just a few minutes later, we heard the sirens of the fire trucks heading our way–and then several trucks racing by–this is a volunteer fire department. They quickly deployed a very large basin from which to pump water onto the dry corn to prevent the spread to the near by woods.
There was a lot of shouting but no-one seemed to be panicky—just matter-of-fact—as if they had practiced putting out combine fires every week. The majority of those First Responders are farmers–all too familiar with the hazards of machinery gone awry. The plume of smoke could be seen for miles away–diesel burns very long and very black.
I thought about offering to help–as I do have industrial fire training–but decided I would contribute by staying out of the way and taking photos. One photo appears in the local paper with my name as photographer–but more photos are here : https://sylviaweirphotos.smugmug.com/Category/Harvester-fire-in-october-2016/i-RWqWnWM/A
Sylvia Weir Art 