Drought Prompts Statewide Ban on Outdoor Burning

Observer Reports

The South Carolina Forestry Commission on Thursday said it will impose a statewide State Forester’s Burning Ban beginning at 7 a.m. Friday, a sweeping restriction meant to curb the risk of fast-moving wildfires as drought deepens, humidity falls and wind gathers ahead of an approaching cold front.

The ban applies to all 46 counties and bars outdoor burning in unincorporated areas, including yard debris fires, prescribed burns, campfires, bonfires and other recreational fires. The commission said the combination of dry fuels, critically low relative humidity and gusty winds has created conditions that could turn even a small spark into a dangerous fire.

“When it’s this dry — energy release component values are at high-to-critical levels — we’re just as likely, if not more, to see wildfires that are fuel-driven rather than wind-driven,” Darryl Jones, the commission’s fire chief, said in a statement. “Add the other volatile conditions of increased wind and lower relative humidity, and it becomes an especially precarious situation”.

The ban does not cover fires used to prepare food or fires contained in approved enclosures, such as portable outdoor fireplaces, chimineas or permanent fire pits made of stone, masonry, metal or other noncombustible materials that meet South Carolina fire codes. Even so, officials said people should use the greatest caution with those exemptions, since the broader fire danger remains elevated.

Residents were also urged to avoid anything that could throw sparks, to keep cars off dry grass and to refrain from using fireworks. The ban will remain in effect until the Forestry Commission announces otherwise.

The decision reflects dilemma in South Carolina where the landscape is dry enough that ordinary habits — a yard burn, a campfire, a spark from machinery — can become liabilities. Record heat and drought in the Upstate are exacerbating the problem.