Texas Fire Kills Mom & Daughter

18 Month Old Girl & Mother Dead
East Texas Fire Burns Trailer

A Texas mother and her 18-month old daughter are dead, in their east Texas tralier home after it was completely covered in flames. As raging wildfires continued to burn in many parts of the state.

The 20-year-old woman and her child had no chance to escape as a wall of flames ravaged their neighbourhood and ultimately their home, Gregg County Sheriff Maxey Cerliano said.

A male occupant of the home was burned but able to escape. He frantically searched for the woman and child but couldn't find them, and their bodies were later found near the bathroom inside the double-wide trailer.

"There were six homes on this road, and it burned all of them," Cerliano told The Associated Press. "All of them just burned to the ground."

The fatalities were first reported by the Tyler Morning Telegraph. The neighbourhood near the community of Gladewater is about 193 kilometres east of Dallas and roughly 100 kilometres west of Shreveport, La.

'We've completely depleted our resources'

It was just one of several hit as dozens of fires spread rapidly across the area. Texas Forest Service officials estimated some 567 were burned in that area alone, destroying homes, barns and vehicles, and thousands of other acres were scorched in other parts of the state.

"We've completely depleted our resources," Melanie Spradling, a public information officer with the Texas Forestry Service, told the Morning Telegraph. "We're on every fire we can possibly handle and then some."

Cerliano said a church, numerous other homes and parts of a cemetery were also destroyed.

"There were many other houses that the fire got right up to the porch," he said.

Authorities said the fires were lingering in part because a cold front was passing through and tropical storm Lee had whipped up winds, in places measured as high as 64 km/h.

"With as hot and dry as the summer was, all that does is fuel the fires," National Weather Service Meteorologist Matt Hemingway said. "Right now, the chances for any rainfall from the tropical storm is basically nil."

'Red flag' warnings

The National Weather Service said south, central and east Texas were all under "red flag" warnings for critical fire conditions until late Sunday night. The wildfire threat became so dire in the Austin area of Central Texas that the Austin Fire Department issued a public appeal for any and all available firefighters in the area to report for duty.

Wildfires scorched more than 2,428 hectares in Bastrop County, just southeast of Austin. Bastrop police spokesman Michal Hubbard told the Austin American-Statesman that hundreds of homes were evacuated in the vicinity of the county seat and several structures were lost.

A wildfire in the Austin suburb of Cedar Park destroyed two homes and damaged two others Sunday. Wildfires also prompted evacuations of other neighborhoods in Cedar Park and some in some suburbs.

In Corsicana, about 80 kilometres south of Dallas, a wildfire spread to and destroyed eight metal industrial shop buildings inside the city.

Mayor Chuck McClanahan said fire crews were fighting to keep the flames from reaching wooden structures.

Navarro County Judge H.M. Davenport said three wildfires had spread to a total of 810 hectares and prompted an evacuation of Navarro, a town of about 200 residents about eight miles southeast of Corsicana, and a sparsely settled rural area close to the nearby town of Mildred.

Ronnie Willis owns a pasture just east of the Corsicana fire. Embers from the industrial park fire burned his field, and Willis could only watch as the fires leaped across his pastures toward his two massive indoor arenas.

"My prayer is it doesn't burn up the buildings," he told the Corsicana Daily Sun. "The grass will grow back. If it doesn't hurt an animal or burn up the buildings, we can live through it. I just feel sorry for the people whose businesses are being destroyed."

Rural neighbourhoods in the east Texas counties of Smith, Van Zandt, Gregg and Houston also were evacuated because of scattered, fast-moving wildfires in those areas. There were no immediate reports of home losses

So many fires across the great state of Texas. From east to west, and north to south. The second largest state in the United States.

What does this mean to you? Tell us - Your Comments Below - Please: