The Fire Department Comes for a Visit

Two nights before, I had been startled during a rain storm by a blinding flash and simultaneous large explosion. Lightning had struck between Sudhanu’s and our house, about a couple of hundred yards on the other side of the state road, as it turned out.

Yesterday our new neighbor Keith, who just built a house on his mother’s land, came over  on his ATV and said he could see smoke coming from across the road. His house is higher up the hill and at a better angle to see that side.

I looked and couldn’t see anything, because the smoke was dissipating by the time it reached the tree tops. I hopped on and we drove above the start of the run (small creek) and entered the pasture on the other side of the tree line.

Sure enough, there the large ash tree that had been hit by lightning and split right down the middle, was still smoldering after two days. The upper parts had fallen at 180 degrees to each other, and still had green leaves on them, but the base had started on fire.

We discussed calling the fire department, as one side of the split tree laid up out of the green grass in the edge of the forest onto the open part of the pasture where there is a lot of dry grass stems. The cows have plenty of pasturage, so they can be choosy when they eat. When the grass sends up the seed stocks, it gets stemmy and a little hard, so the spoiled cows just eat the soft grasses around them.

The concern was if that side of the split tree kept burning, it would get into the dry grass and if that started burning, Brahma’s house could be threatened.

On the other hand, it is a volunteer fire department, and I didn’t want to waste their time. Volunteer firemen are the real lifeblood of a community, the good guys. Instead of calling 911, Keith had his mother call a friend of hers who is the assistant fire chief. He sent out two guys with a small truck to investigate. They assessed the situation and put in the call to the county to blow the siren and call in the rest of the company.

When I mentioned about wasting their time, they said never hesitate, they prefer erring on the side of caution instead of getting called in when it was a real mess.

They brought another truck with more hose, which they pulled out through the woods and extinguished the fire. They cut through the trunk above the hot spots to make sure the fire hadn’t traveled up into the trunks, then set those pieces up on end and really soaked them, then saturated the ground around the area.

To see a larger picture that shows actual coals burning, click the thumbnail below.

” Less intelligent men cannot conceive of the transcendental all-spiritual form of the Lord, but they are astounded by His different energies, just as the aborigines are struck with wonder by the manifestation of lightning, a gigantic mountain or a hugely expanded banyan tree. The aborigines praise the strength of the tiger and the elephant because of their superior energy and strength. “

SB 2.1.24

Count me among the astonished when I saw the power of lightning to split such a large tree.