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American Morning

Florida Fires: Officials Offer Reward for Information on Suspected Arsonist

Aired April 23, 2001 - 10:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, turning now to Florida, where fire crews are waging a battle against both man and nature: Some 64 wildfires are burning in Central and South Florida. Another two dozen or so have been smothered by armies of firefighters.

Officials say a three-year-old drought has set the stage, but it is arsonists who have seized the lead in this early arrival of the burning season. And one in three fires have been intentionally set.

For the latest now, we're joined on the telephone by Chuck Johnston of the Division of Forestry in North Port, Florida.

Chuck, thanks for being with us.

CHUCK JOHNSTON, FLORIDA DIVISION OF FORESTRY: Thank you for having me.

PHILLIPS: Can you tell us the latest: any leads with whom -- with regard to who has been starting these fires?

JOHNSTON: Our law enforcement division is very aggressively following any leads that are coming up on this. We've also got an arson alert line set up, and a $10,000 award, $5,000 from the Arson Alert Association and a $5,000 from Florida Department of Law Enforcement match on that.

So, at this time, we don't have anything to report that we can put out. But I'm sure that with the amount of investigators that are out there, and the reward, that hopefully that will be helpful in the search for the arsonist.

PHILLIPS: Well, let's talk about the effects. What is the latest with damage and how people are being affected by this -- especially residential-wise?

JOHNSTON: We met with a property-appraisers' office this morning. They were at our morning staff briefing. And they are going to have us some figures along with our investigators that have been out and looking. So they are going to have us some good dollar figures here within the next few days. They are visiting every home and getting a GPS location of every place that has got damage on it. So it's so widespread throughout this area. And some of the damage is so extensive, it's really taken a small task force of people just to be able to put a handle on the damage.

PHILLIPS: Now, the fires are contained, but that doesn't mean they're controlled, right?

JOHNSTON: Yesterday, from the briefing this morning that we got, that yesterday there were some small pockets of green area that were still unburned inside of the -- one of the fire areas. They have got crews that were in there. They took care of that with a helicopter in the crews yesterday. And they are finishing mopping that up today.

We haven't released the Gold Team, which is our instant- management team. They are continuing that mop-up process -- no arson fires yesterday in the district. However, we did have a 400 acre fire, which had the potential to damage some homes and also close the interstate. But we were able to contain to 400 acres. It was caused by a downed power line.

PHILLIPS: Now, Chuck, you're mentioning the damage to the homes. But there -- have there been any actual evacuations?

JOHNSTON: No. In fact, on yesterday's fire that we had, we actually did some evacuation through the Sarasota -- or, excuse me -- the Charlotte County Sheriff's Department. This was along Oil Well Road in South Charlotte County. And there were approximately 20 homes that were evacuated just as a precaution due to the fire conditions that we were having. But everything turned out very well on that fire.

PHILLIPS: Chuck Johnston, we will continue to check in with you -- Division of Forestry -- thank you, sir.

JOHNSTON: Thank you.

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