Stoneham Middlesex Fells Fire Burned 1 Acre Tuesday: Fire Chief

STONEHAM, MA — Firefighters had to pour more than 5,000 gallons of water on a roughly one-acre fire in the Middlesex Fells Reservation in Stoneham on Tuesday morning, according to Fire Chief Matthew Grafton.

The fire, which occupied crews for between three and four hours, was another reminder, Grafton said, of drought conditions that have made the summer of 2022 a particularly frustrating one for local fire departments.

“We need rain in a bad way,” Grafton told Patch this week.

This most recent fire kicked off near Woodland Road. It burned deep in the woods, farther from area walking trails than other recent fires, according to Grafton.

Firefighters were not able to determine a cause for the blaze. In an interview, though, Grafton said crews had encountered close to a half dozen fires in the preceding week. In some of those cases, he said, crews found the remnants of campfires.

The rate of fires this summer has been worse than rates in recent years, Grafton said. Drought conditions are leaving ample kindling to help fan flames. Embers are also boring deeper into the forest floor itself, according to Grafton, requiring more water to douse.

In at least two problem areas within Stoneham’s slice of the Fells, crews have left the scene of a fire only to return to find it reignited.

“When we get these drought conditions, we will end up having brush fires,” Grafton said. “But it's been a couple years since we've had brush like this.”

The situation is taxing for crews involved, Grafton said. Among challenges, fire areas are largely far from water supplies. As such, personnel from the state Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) have been working with Stoneham firefighters to truck water into the Fells in tankers.

Other departments are facing similar issues.

In Malden, Fire Chief William Sullivan said this week that his department had responded to 29 fires involving vegetation, brush and/or other natural landscaping materials within city limits since May 1.

That marked a nearly fivefold increase compared to data in the same time span in 2021 and 2020, when Malden saw six and seven fires respectively, Sullivan said.

“This lack of rainfall has allowed wooded areas to dry out to the point that it doesn’t take much for a fire to start and spread quickly,” Sullivan said.

While Malden is seeing such vegetation, brush and/or landscaping fires throughout its territory, responses in the Fells have been time intensive, requiring aid from neighboring departments and the DCR.

“At these incidents we are all working together to confine and extinguish the fire in a coordinated effort,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan called for certain safety measures from the public, additionally asking those who smoke outside to ensure that they fully extinguish smoking materials in a metal container filled with sand or water.

“Do not throw smoking materials on the ground,” he said.

Grafton similarly called for caution from the general public. Anyone who sees smoke in the Fells should call 9-1-1, he said, adding that specific information to help locate a fire can be valuable to responders.

“Everyone should be very careful and cautious,” Grafton said.

Regionally, the U.S. Drought Monitor on Friday expanded its assessment of drought conditions, now placing a larger swath of the state in its “severe” drought category. That area includes all of Middlesex County.

The state is separately tracking the drought, asking residents to limit water usage while being cautious about fire-prone conditions.