CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Last month alone, tens of thousands of acres of land in the Coastal Bend burned.
"It's been more active, and the fires have been larger," said Chief Dale Scott of Nueces County ESD #2. "Normally we can handle a brush fire with two trucks and we're finding that we may need five or six trucks because they spread so quickly."
Scott said we have all the ingredients for a stubborn fire right in our backyard.
"With the drought conditions and then the freeze that came along," Scott said. "Also, we've had a lot of red flag warnings, low humidity, high winds".
Scott said he's asking the community to be mindful going into the Easter holiday because, so far, this fire season has taken its toll on our fire departments.
"A lot of the grass fires are lasting anywhere from six to eight hours," Scott said.
Brandon Harper co-owns Nueces Brewing Co. He's pretty much a barbecue expert and he's done it almost his whole life. He shared with 3News some tips for folks before they light their pit.
"Make sure you know what the wind's doing," Harper said. "Block the wind from your pit so that nothing will get blown out of the fire box. Get you a five-gallon bucket full of water and leave it right next to your pit."
And if a grease fire happens to start, they said do not add water to it and call for help immediately.
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