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Fire Extinguished on Blueberry Island in Rome, Maine

June 01, 2010 - ROME -- Firefighters on Monday battled a blaze on Blueberry Island on Long Pond after accessing the island by boats and using portable pumps to douse the flames.

About 15 firefighters from Rome, Mount Vernon and Belgrade fought the fire, which burned about an acre of the 2-acre island, according to Fire Chief Gary Foss.

No one lives on the privately owned island, which has a lot of small trees, bushes and rocks, he said.

The island owners reported they discovered several men on the island Sunday who had a campfire and they (owners) asked them to extinguish the fire and leave, according to Foss.

Foss said the men apparently did put the fire out, but a hot ember likely reignited. He said he does not know who the people are who started the fire.

Monday's fire was reported around 7:30 a.m. by someone at Long Lake Cottages across the lake, Foss said. The island owners had tried to put the fire out themselves but were unsuccessful, he said.

Belgrade and Mount Vernon fire departments launched boats from the Castle Island boat landing, and Castle Island Camps also volunteered boats, Foss said.

The fire was challenging to fight.

"There's water all around you," Foss said. "We take our portable pumps and draft our water out of the lake. There's a lot of hand tools and hand work involved."

Foss said firefighters coated the island terrain with foam with the hope that wind did not pick up again.

He said conditions were dry Monday, and the fire danger was high. He cautioned people who have a campfire to keep it as small as possible and make sure it is doused completely with water and raked over.

"Even though it's nice and green, it's been fairly dry," he said. "We haven't had a lot of rain. We've had a lot of wind."

Blueberry Island is about a quarter-mile from the mainland, according to Foss. He said Smithfield firefighters stood by to help. Firefighters left the island around 11:30 a.m., he said.

Foss said that fires on islands in the Belgrade Lakes region typically are caused by campfires not fully extinguished, or by lightning.

"It's not a very common thing, but I would say it happens, on average, maybe once a year," he said.

by Amy Calder, Kennebec Journal, June 1, 2010

Lakes: Long Pond
Regions: Belgrade


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