Rain helps dampen fires in East Tennessee, crews hope to mobilize to knock them out on Thursday
SEVIER COUNTY, Tenn. (WYMT/WVLT) - Several communities in East Tennessee are under mandatory evacuation orders due to rapidly spreading wildfires.
While officials say the rain did help dampen them to some degree, they still have to get up in the hills to get them completely under control.
One of the hardest-hit areas is the Wears Valley of Sevier County, just seven miles away from popular tourist destination Pigeon Forge.
That particular fire, known as the Hatcher Mountain Road/Indigo Lane Fire, has already destroyed 1,000 acres and at least 35 buildings and sent one person to UT Medical Center with injuries.
Officials are still trying to figure out what caused the fire which started on Wednesday afternoon as high winds moved through the region. A second part of the fire started after midnight due to downed power lines.
You can watch Will Puckett’s live report from Thursday’s edition of Mountain News This Morning above and see WVLT’s continuing coverage of the fire here.
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