More than 80 firefighters spent Monday afternoon and evening battling flames in Concord, New Hampshire, keeping a quickly spreading brush fire from reaching nearby neighborhoods.
By 8:30 p.m. most of the crews had gone home, only four firefighter remained in the woods guarding the black edge of the brush fire.
The site and sounds stopped traffic. Erich Roth and his friend Mike Cunath were driving by and pulled over to watch crews do their work.
"That was really cool, I have never seen a helicopter, at least locally, dump water on a fire," Roth said.
Flames broke out around 1:00 p.m. and ripped through about forty acres of woods adjacent to a state park in West Concord off of Lake View Drive.
"We did have a lot of fire tornadoes that were picking up and dropping balls of fire," explained Lt. Ken Kiehl with the Concord Fire Department.
Lt. Kiehl says the firefighters were dealing with steep terrain.
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"It goes up and down, there are some flat areas too, but it's difficult to get equipment in and out," he said.
By 9 p.m. Lt. Kiehl said there were still some flames burning, but nightfall forced firefighters out of the woods.
"The job is not done but they did an awesome job today," he said.
Nearby residents agree.
"Definitely there were a lot of hardworking firefighters out there," Cunath said.
Lt. Keihl says there are not any homes or properties in danger. Crews will return to the scene early Tuesday morning to reassess.
