Thursday night embers sparked new flames
Friday - In the thick of it!
BLOOMING GROVE - The Round Hill Fire sparked back up on Thursday night and circled Round Hill. By the middle of the night residents were getting frightened and saying they could feel the heat in their homes and a drone photo showed the hillside largely encircled in red. Throughout early Friday morning the smoke crept down the hillside and across Route 208 and started filling the fields of Round Hill Road's western link. At its worst, till now, flames came within 100 ft. of one house and several homes on Taramar Lane were evacuated.
At 12:30 on Friday, Town Supervisor Rob Jeroloman said that while the air has cleared West of the center of the fire,, that is because the wind direction has shifted farther to the East. He said that while the situation is more stable now, "This fire is far from over," adding that emergency services have told him that he will probably still be there monitoring the situation tomorrow morning."
He added, "Firefighters and NYS Forestry Rangers are on site, fighting the fire. They are knocking down the fire NYS Police and NYS Forestry Rangers are operating a helicopter and dropping water on the fire sites. We have Rockland County, Ulster County and numerous Orange County Fire Departments are on the fire site now."
Round Hill Elementary School was closed, and its giant parking area set up as a staging area for firefighters from all over the region, including State Park Rangers, Tuxedo Park, Monroe, Monell, Mt. Lodge, Cronomer Hill, Orange County and more, along with what became a very welcome constant brigade of helicopters wielding giant buckets of water. At about 10am a representative from Homeland Security arrived. Jeroloman said they continue to have a dedicated helicopter bringing additional water. The firefighting teams will likely continue saturating hot spots throughout Friday and possibly even Saturday since it only takes one spark carried in the breeze to rekindle a blaze, and Round Hill Mt. and surrounding forest and farmland has endless dry leaves that could bring the area right back into serious danger at any time.
Where there's smoke.....
Additional firefighting units arrive throughout Friday
Homeland Security Arrives
Ready to go for another round
Definitely not over till it's over...a few sparks lit up another section with flames Thurs. Night
Rain will be very welcome over the next few days, but residents will not soon forget how officials and firefighters worked to keep them safe during the Round Hill Fire of 2023.