Rapid City fire crews battled multiple blazes and high winds Wednesday afternoon. Responders are still gathering information about what caused the fires.
The fires burned along Skyline Drive, a high-income residential neighborhood on the west side of Rapid City, sparking just after 1:30 in the afternoon.
Rapid City Fire Department public information officer Tessa Jaeger said these burned close enough to combine.
“It was reported as three separate fires that turned into two separate fires after two of those had combined," Jaeger said. "We had reports of downed power lines. A caller reported a possible electrical transformer explosion. Right now the exact cause remains under investigation.”
While those are unverified reports, some west Rapid streetlights were down during the afternoon and required police presence. However, most power was still on for most of the area.
This fire came the same day much of the Black Hills were in a high wind advisory, a complication Jaeger said was handled by responding crews.
“When you have a fire and then this wind, it pushes that fire very quickly, making it grow quicker," Jaeger said. "So, that definitely makes it more difficult for our firefighters to fight the blaze. Makes it more difficult for sure, but they did a really good job of getting it under control as quickly as they did.”
A fire line has stopped the forward progress of the fire. No evacuation orders are in place, and no structures are threatened. Despite this, heavy fire activity was ongoing at Skyline Drive as of Wednesday afternoon.
“Due to the ongoing operations and the downed power lines, we still are asking people to avoid the area to allow firefighters to work safely,” Jaeger said
RCFD plans to remain on scene to monitor the area for hot spots. The precise size of the fire had not been determined as of Wednesday afternoon.
