{"id":28796,"date":"2019-09-27T11:30:03","date_gmt":"2019-09-27T15:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/?p=28796"},"modified":"2019-09-27T11:34:29","modified_gmt":"2019-09-27T15:34:29","slug":"drought-conditions-bring-heightened-risk-of-wildfire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2019\/09\/27\/drought-conditions-bring-heightened-risk-of-wildfire\/","title":{"rendered":"Drought Conditions Bring Heightened Risk of Wildfire"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Marylanders Urged to Take Extra Precautions<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright \" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/3713\/10350889894_8e6ab9fb38.jpg\" alt=\"Photo of forest fire in Maryland\" width=\"378\" height=\"259\" \/>The <a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.maryland.gov\/Pages\/default.aspx\">Maryland Department of Natural Resources <\/a>warns residents and visitors that potential for <a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.maryland.gov\/forests\/Pages\/wfm.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">wildfires<\/a> has steadily increased in the past several weeks due to a lack of rain and unseasonably high temperatures.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">While open-air burning is legal in parts of Maryland, the department strongly encourages homeowners to refrain from outdoor burning until the state receives significant steady rainfall of one inch or more. Open-air burning is the leading cause of wildfires in Maryland.\u00a0<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">&#8220;All of the indicators that fire management officials use to monitor fire danger are reaching record levels for this time of year,\u201d Maryland Forest Service Acting State Fire Supervisor Chris Robertson said. \u201cFires that occur under these conditions will be difficult to control.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">During dry conditions, embers can easily ignite dry leaves or other forest fuels and start a wildfire. Caution should be taken with all other outdoor activities that may spark a wildfire such as campfires, smoking, and equipment usage. Further restrictions may need to be implemented if the dry weather pattern continues.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you would like more information, please contact Chris Robertson, Acting State Fire Supervisor at 410-260-8503.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Marylanders Urged to Take Extra Precautions The Maryland Department of Natural Resources warns residents and visitors that potential for wildfires has steadily increased in the past several weeks due to a lack of rain and unseasonably high temperatures.\u00a0 While open-air burning is legal in parts of Maryland, the department strongly encourages homeowners to refrain from<a href=\"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2019\/09\/27\/drought-conditions-bring-heightened-risk-of-wildfire\/\">&nbsp;&nbsp;Read the Rest&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[957,1965],"tags":[4946,3024,3834],"class_list":["post-28796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appnews","category-maryland-forest-service","tag-forest","tag-wildfire","tag-wildland-fires"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28796"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28799,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28796\/revisions\/28799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}