ROCKBRIDGE COUNTY, Va. – An end is near for containing the Matts Creek wildfire following Tuesday’s rainfall.
Officials said three and a half inches fell on the wildfire, equaling about 1.1 billion gallons of water.
Because of the rain, the size of the fire had remained at around 11,000 acres and containment is at 57% as of 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. Later in the evening, officials made the announcement that the fire was 84% contained.
Since the fire stopped growing, a section of the Blue Ridge Parkway was reopened and the smoke has subsided.
Fire Resource Advisor, Pete Irvine is thanking Mother Nature.
“She’s been able to put more rain on the fire in one day than we were able to in nine [days],” said Irvine.
While the wildfire is not expected to grow any larger, the work is far from over for the group of 300 people working on the Matts Creek wildfire.
“We anticipate as the weather dries out over the next few days smoke will reemerge from the interior of the fire. They are not a threat to the fire line. We’ve got personnel working on them,” said Irvine.
Crews are still investigating the cause of the wildfire. Early signs point to it not being natural.
“When I say it wasn’t a natural ignition, it wasn’t lightning-caused, we are pretty sure of that. So it was human-caused, but determining how that happened it’s very hard,” said Fire Behavior Analyst, Greg Titus.