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38 states send help to fight blazesBy KATHERINE PFLEGER © St. Petersburg Times, published July 3, 1998 A complicated bureaucratic machine has mobilized more than 4,500 workers, including 2,186 from outside Florida, to do everything from fight fires to cook meals. About 600 National Guardsmen, more than 1,000 Florida state employees and 160 members of the U.S. National Forestry Service are on hand in Florida. One of the newest arrivals is Federal Emergency Management Agency Director James Lee Witt, who flew to Tallahassee to meet with Gov. Lawton Chiles and other state officials Thursday. Today, he plans to tour the state's hardest-hit areas, said FEMA spokesman Mark Wilson. Though Chiles reportedly has begged FEMA to send more manpower and machinery, Fire Information Officer Jack Conner said "there's plenty of resources." In addition to roughly 80 bulldozers, 154 fire engines -- accompanied by three to five firefighters each -- have already been dispatched. On Thursday, the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, rounded up 75 more. Ten East Coast-based engines are embarking on a two-day drive to Volusia County, while FEMA is coordinating efforts to fly the remaining 65 engines to Jacksonville Naval Air Station. "The real concern," Conner said, "is having enough people to send in fresh crews" to relieve firefighters, some of whom are working 16-hour days. Their tours are supposed to last 21 days, at most. Throughout the country, NIFC is also coordinating efforts to put out fires in Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona. But that's not unusual for this time of year. The good news is "this fire season has gotten off to a slow start for the rest of the country," said NIFC spokeswoman Jenelle Smith. "In fact, it's a little slow."
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ASHINGTON -- As fires continue to blaze, 38 states have dispatched thousands of people and tons of machinery to help quench the Sunshine State, and more help is on the way.
