Lake City, Fla. – Authorities briefly reopened two highways crossing northern Florida into Georgia on Sunday before dense wildfire smoke forced them to again halt traffic, while hundreds of Florida residents waited to return to their threatened homes.
Officials said the wildfire that raced through the Okefenokee Swamp in southeastern Georgia and into Florida had charred more than 233,700 acres – about 365 square miles – since it was started by lightning nine days ago.
Authorities reopened 90 miles of Interstates 75 and 10 for a couple of hours Sunday morning after wind helped push the heavy smoke away from the highways. But they were later forced to close 35 miles of I-75 from the Florida-Georgia state line to Lake City, Fla., as well as a 40-mile stretch of I-10 in Florida from Live Oak to Sanderson.
A 15-mile stretch of I-75 from Valdosta, Ga., to the Florida state line remained open Sunday.
The fire started May 5 in the middle of the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. It took just six days to grow larger than another wildfire that has burned nearly 121,000 acres of Georgia forest and swampland over more than three weeks. The small fire was started by a tree falling on a power line.
Elsewhere, a blaze feeding on drought-stricken forest in northern Minnesota was only 15 percent contained as of Sunday. The fire had burned a combined 93 square miles in Minnesota and nearby Canada.
Off the coast of Southern California, continued cool weather Sunday helped firefighters on Santa Catalina Island maintain control of a blaze that had threatened the resort town of Avalon.
