Teens playing with fireworks start dumpster fire in Morgan County
Jul 3, 2022, 10:19 AM | Updated: Jul 5, 2022, 1:59 pm
MORGAN COUNTY, Utah – Firefighters said some teens setting off fireworks started a small dumpster fire in Morgan County Saturday night.
Firefighters said some teens setting off fireworks started a small dumpster fire in Morgan County Saturday night.
“Morgan county deputies were called for shots fired,” said Brian Brendel Fire Chief for the Mountain Green Fire Protection District.
Fire crews managed to put down the flames quickly but the incident highlighted how concerned fire officials were over the dangerous combination of fireworks, drought, and red flag conditions this weekend.
The teens were shooting off fireworks at the bowery at the stake center on Cottonwood Canyon Rd.
“When they were in a hurry to get out of the area, they dumped their fireworks into a dumpster,” Brendel said.
The teens got away as fire crews took down the dumpster fire.
“We found a couple of the sticks that go with rockets,” Brendel explained. “So that, unfortunately, tells us that some of them were aerial fireworks, which is really a bad news situation for us, especially since this is a red flag weekend.”
Red flag conditions are in place Sunday over much of the state. That means high winds can push fires to grow quickly. The ongoing drought and dry conditions only increased the potential for a large fire.
The fire department urged parents to talk with their kids about the current fire danger and show them the video below as a reminder of what happened in St. George a few years ago. Teenagers shooting off fireworks also started the 12,000-acre Turkey Farm Road Fire.
“You have a possibility of explosive fire growth,” Brendel expressed. “What does that mean? That means that everything is dry enough, and the wind is just right, plus the humidity is low enough: all of those things combine to make fire run faster than you can.”
Fireworks are banned in all of Morgan County with the exception of parts of Morgan City. Brendel says that about 85 percent of Mountain Green is in the wildland-urban interface, putting a lot of homes close to dry fuels.
