Unfortunately, concerns about dangerous fire weather conditions came to a scorching climax on Tuesday afternoon as a major wind-driven field fire broke out near Ogden, Illinois. The fire began around 2 PM on October 29th, and by 3 PM it had jumped Interstate 74 and Highway 150 shutting both roads down.
Aware of the dangerous fire conditions and potential for areas of blowing dust, I decided to grab an afternoon coffee from a local drive-through and take a stroll across the back roads of Champaign County to see how things were evolving. I was south of Champaign-Urbana when I was alerted of the field fire beginning near Ogden shortly after 2 PM. By 2:15 PM I could see the large plume of smoke.
Since winds were howling out of the south and blowing smoke north, I decided to come in from the south of the fire. I drove through Sidney on my way to Homer, stopping at the Casey's on the north side of Homer to fill up my empty gas tank and snap a photo of the smoke plume. A Champaign County Sheriff's deputy whizzed passed with lights and sirens running as it headed north toward Ogden. I continued north on Hwy 49 toward the fire.
Smoke plume visible from Homer:
I stopped on the south side of Ogden first, where you could see the fire threatening homes on the east side of town. Next, I made my way north into town, stopping on the I-74 overpass to document the stopped traffic due to the fire and thick smoke plume crossing the road. I noted flames north of the interstate and what appeared to be another uptick in the fire before a herd of fire trucks and emergency vehicles went flying past me heading from the south side of Ogden to the farm roads north of Ogden. The fire was now rapidly spreading through the dry farm fields north of the interstate.
I went a couple of miles north and stopped on 1800 N Road near the county line. The scene was rather jaw-dropping at this point. Flames were reaching 10-15 feet into the air as the fire tore through an unharvested corn field. Firefighters and farmers both worked hard through these dangerous conditions to limit the spread of the fire, spraying down surrounding fields and pulling discs behind tractors to turn over the soil and limit available fuel for the fire.
I moved north and east to get ahead of the fire before I joined Illinois Public Media/WILL AM 580 live on the air at 4 PM to give an update on the situation. I was surprised to be able to report that from my location the smoke plume appeared to be shrinking. It seemed impossible at 3:30 as the fire and high winds raged that 30 minutes later the fire could be contained.
Sure enough, the massive smoke plume quickly became a smaller smoke plume, and then from a smoke plume to a small dust cloud as farmers and firefighters continued to work the ground, and then eventually a clear quiet fell over the area. I spent another hour or 90 minutes directing traffic that had been diverted from I-74 and Hwy 150 onto the rural farm roads north of Ogden and surveyed some of the damage done to the crops before I started making my way back home to Champaign-Urbana, about 15 miles west of Ogden.
Remarkably, it appears that the efforts of fire fighters, farmers, and others saved farms and structures that were in the path of the fire.
