Wild Animal Sets Wildfire In Beaufort County

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Posted: 10:26 PM Jul 6, 2008
Last Updated: 6:48 PM Jul 7, 2008
Reporter: Lynnette Taylor

15 comments

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Fire investigators say a hawk, sparked a field fire this afternoon that came dangerously close to burning down a farm house in beaufort county.

Firefighters responded to a freshly cut wheat field off pamlico beach road just before 5:30 this afternoon.

The dry stubs left in the field quickly spread, but John Pack with Emergency Management says, the winds died down long enough for them to gain the upper hand on the flames.

Crews from Sidney, Belhaven And Pantego, protected the structure from the raging flames and put out hot spots. In the end, 8 acres had been burned.

Later they found a dead hawk at the base of a electrical pole and downed powerlines.

They suspect the hawk landed on the wires, snapped the powerlines, causing sparks to rain down on the field.

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Comments are posted from viewers like you and do not always reflect the views of this station.

Posted by: headhoss-kingsling on Jul 8, 2008 at 12:40 AM
i see why this USA we live in is so screwd up some people just dont get it hawks,trees, wind, MAN PLEASE it was a red tail hawk and he flew in and hit 2 lines at the same time which causes a short which will break the line, some of you sould try it sometime ! THEN YOULL KNOW WHOS FAULT IT IS some of you need to get real..and yes I was there

Posted by: Anonymous on Jul 8, 2008 at 12:16 AM
Nice mugshot of a hawk. What was he arrested for the first time. Serves him right, that feathered habitual felon, snapping power lines and generally wreaking havoc. Though it would Have been respectful Of his memory write In complete sentences and capitalize The, right words. It Also would have been nice. to ; use proper Punctuation? I live near wheat fields and am concerned about the stubs spreading. There's a lot of harvesting been going on and it could take my land. Can you Do an article, about that. nICE, joB~

Posted by: common sense Location: pitt county on Jul 7, 2008 at 10:14 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdqFbnZPzxw This video is not an exact scenario, but can you picture a hawk, a bird of prey with a large wing span, somehow inadvertently causing this? If contact is made between two lines for a just the right amount of time, could not the line snap due to the heat generated?

Posted by: chris Location: roper on Jul 7, 2008 at 09:10 PM
Hard to comprehend how a hawk can snap a powerline. I can comprehend a shotgun blast killing a hawk and severing a powerline. Might make for a good CSI TV show...at least it would be better than the same old CSI Stuff on TV every night.

Posted by: clifton Location: washington on Jul 7, 2008 at 07:37 PM
I am still trying to figure out how the hawk broke a power line. I've seen pole rattled really hard by cars and trucks but the wires never broke. This hawk must weigh twenty thousand pounds. Sure hope it did not have relatives.

Posted by: Anonymous Location: Beaufort County on Jul 7, 2008 at 01:46 PM
Here goes the news again messing up a story. Pungo River Fire Dept was not even at this fire. It was Sidney, Belhaven and Pantego Fire Depts. And i never heard anything on the scanner about a wheat field. All the firefighters kept saying the marsh was on fire, but it could have very well had been a wheat field. I dont know i wasn't there but i do know Pungo River never went.

Posted by: Blog Refuter Location: NC on Jul 7, 2008 at 12:24 PM
Wow! Just take time and think about it. If a hawk messes with a power line, and sparks fall to dry grounds and start the fire, then the hawk is the blame. No one placed the hawk up there, it flew up there; therefore, it is the hawk's fault. If a tree falls on a power line and a fire is ignited, who or what is at fault? Well, it depends on what caused the tree to fall on the power line. If someone was cutting the tree down, then it's that person's fault. If the wind blew the tree down, then it could be argued that it's the wind's fault, but it could also be argued that it's the fault of the person(s) who refused to keep maintenance on the tree by keeping it below the height of the power lines. However, it could never be an inanimate tree's fault. A tree falling on a power line is a little more involved than a hawk flying to a power line, so the blame can easily be placed on the hawk. Actually, the blame could be placed on another entity, but I won't make this a philosophical discussion.

Posted by: Anonymous on Jul 7, 2008 at 10:19 AM
Boy, this headline was a little over the top, don't ya think? Anything to get a story read, I guess.

Posted by: LOL Location: NC on Jul 7, 2008 at 09:37 AM
Elementary my dear, Elementary!

Posted by: J Location: Gville on Jul 7, 2008 at 09:19 AM
Oh, so now we are blaming animals? Do the whales make it flood?

Posted by: Chris Location: Windsor on Jul 7, 2008 at 06:22 AM
Actually it would have been the tree's fault if it fell on the line ;-)

Posted by: common sense Location: pitt county on Jul 6, 2008 at 11:22 PM
Semantics, mom... The hawk landed on the line. The line snapped. Then sparks from this event caused the fire. If the hawk had not landed on the line, would the line have snapped? If a tornado rages though your neighborhood and the winds from it blow a tree down, thus smashing your car, what would you tell the insurance adjuster? The tree just fell? Do you make no mention of the tornado? Are you one of those types that says guns should be banned because they kill people? Does the gun chamber a bullet into itself, lift itself up, point itself at someone, then pull its own trigger?

Posted by: Dave Location: Greenville on Jul 6, 2008 at 11:15 PM
That just goes to show that hawks shouldn't play with matches.

Posted by: Cactus Location: Strabane, NC on Jul 6, 2008 at 11:01 PM
Poor raptor. God bless.

Posted by: mom Location: Pitt County on Jul 6, 2008 at 10:06 PM
This was the hawk's fault? If a tree had fallen on the power lines would it be the tree's fault? I don't think so.