Over 1,200 square miles have burned
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — The Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry has sent seven wildland firefighters to Woodward, Oklahoma, to fight wildfires there.
Commissioner Mike Strain said Tuesday that they’ll be in Oklahoma for about three weeks.
Oklahoma Forestry Services said late Monday that more than 1,200 square miles have burned, and the fires in northwestern Oklahoma and southwestern Kansas were 63 percent contained. It said the fires have killed one person in each state and destroyed “vast acreage of rangeland,” killing thousands of livestock.
Strain says in a news release that the Louisiana firefighters were chosen from different parts of the state to ensure that all areas remain staffed.
The department has a mutual aid agreement, called the South Central Forest Fire Compact, with Oklahoma, Arkansas, Mississippi and Texas.
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