Conditions still too dry
LEE COUNTY, IOWA -- The burn ban in Lee County is not going away anytime soon.
KHQA spoke with Lee County Emergency Management director Steve Cirinna who says that it may be awhile before the ban is lifted.
Cirinna issued the burn ban on July 19th after discussing the dry conditions with fire chiefs from around the county.
Like most of the tri-states conditions in Lee County have not improved much since the ban was issued.
Steve Cirinna says that the ground is severely cracked and hard like concrete in Lee County and that both the grass and the trees are going dormant. And although the area is experiencing cooler temperatures, Cirinna notes that we are headed into the "official" dry season of the year.
Like everyone else in the Tri-States, Steve Cirinna would like to see three or fours days of steady rainfall in the county.
He says anything short of that will just run off the ground and won't do the area any significant good.
The burn ban includes no open burning and no barrel burning in the county.
Some people in the county have applied for permission to burn and been denied by fire chiefs in their district.
Some fireworks shows in the county were also canceled because of the extremely dry conditions.
See a map of all the burn bans in effect in Iowa here: http://www.dps.state.ia.us/fm/main/burnbans/index.shtml.
TV Station Profiles & Public Inspection Files forKHQA