Bulloch County Wildfire Hits 75% Containment as Dangerous Heat Returns

Firefighters pushed the Buie Driggers Road wildfire east of Brooklet to 75% containment by 8 p.m. Sunday, with the Georgia Forestry Commission (GFC), the state agency leading the response, putting its footprint at 389.90 acres. Crews spent the day drowning hotspots and cutting fresh firebreaks through gusty wind that kept testing the fire’s edges.

It is the second time officials have called this fire under control. Bulloch County Fire declared it contained Friday night, at about 250 acres. It grew anyway, through pine woods still tangled with Hurricane Helene’s fallen timber, into the nearly 390 acre fire crews faced Sunday.

Containment Climbs to 75 Percent After a Restless Weekend

Bulloch County Public Safety and Emergency Management said ground and air crews had a productive Sunday, clearing most of the remaining hotspots and reinforcing the lines cut around the burn area.

One hotspot tried to flare up during the afternoon. Crews caught it before it crossed the containment line. Officials said gusty wind kept firefighters on alert for hours afterward.

County trucks hauled 24 tanker loads of water to the scene Sunday, spraying it along the fire’s edges to stop embers from jumping the line. Sheriff’s deputies held positions at intersections near the burn area overnight and plan to keep that presence up until crews return to the fire at 7 a.m. Monday.

Officials again asked residents and visitors to stay out of the area so responders have room to work.

The Fire Bulloch County Already Declared Out Once

The blaze started with a lightning strike in the pine flats along Buie Driggers Road, north of U.S. Highway 80, the GFC has reported. What happened over the next three days is why officials are not celebrating yet.

1. Thursday, July 23: Crews are called to a lightning sparked fire burning in woods along Buie Driggers Road.
2. Friday, July 24, 5:30 p.m.: The fire reaches roughly 250 to 450 acres and threatens five to 15 homes, with 10 tractors working to control the burn. The sheriff’s office closes Buie Driggers Road between Bryant Still Road and Arcola Road.
3. Friday, July 24, 8 p.m.: Bulloch County Fire declares the fire contained and pulls its units. GFC crews stay behind to monitor the ground.
4. Saturday, July 25: Crews are back on scene for a third day, with containment measured at 75%.
5. Sunday, July 26, 8 p.m.: The footprint has grown to 389.90 acres, still at 75% containment, with crews from a dozen counties now on the ground.

Officials have not explained why the fire kept spreading after Friday’s containment call. Hurricane Helene may be part of the answer. Its fallen timber has been drying in these woods since 2024.

Why Does South Georgia Keep Catching Fire?

Lightning sparked the Buie Driggers Road fire, but the fuel underneath it explains why the blaze kept outrunning containment lines. Hurricane Helene knocked down enormous volumes of timber across South Georgia in the fall of 2024. Much of it is still on the ground, dead and dried into heavy fuel that burns hotter and resists control.

Governor Brian Kemp treated that fuel buildup as a statewide emergency once already this year. He declared a state of emergency over wildfires burning across South Georgia on April 22, after one blaze, the Pinelands Road Fire, swelled past 9,000 acres and forced evacuations. A companion executive order eased truck weight limits for salvage timber haulers across 17 counties. That gave landowners more time to move fire and storm damaged wood before it lost its market value.

Three months later, the same dynamic played out on a smaller scale in Bulloch County. A single lightning strike found enough dead wood to grow into a fire that needed help from a dozen counties to slow down.

Mill Closures Leave Storm Debris Standing

The salvage math is complicated by a mill industry shrinking for reasons that have nothing to do with fire. Foreign competition, cheaper recycled fiber and lighter packaging have already pulled Georgia’s paper mill count down from 11 to eight, according to The Current, a nonprofit newsroom based in Savannah that has tracked the closures.

• International Paper – closed three mills in southeast Georgia, eliminating 1,100 jobs
• Georgia-Pacific – closing its Cedar Springs containerboard mill in Early County by Aug. 1, affecting 535 workers
• West Fraser – closing its Augusta lumber mill in Richmond County by the end of the year

Fewer running mills mean less capacity to haul away dead and storm damaged wood, Helene’s included, which leaves more of it standing in the woods to dry out. A wave of Georgia sawmill closures deepening the industry’s squeeze is unfolding at the same time the state is asking landowners to clear more timber, not less. The University of Georgia’s Cooperative Extension has already flagged a widening pine sawtimber shortage in Helene-hit counties, where growth-to-removal ratios were thin even before the storm.

Crews From a Dozen Counties, Most of Them Unpaid

The response has scaled well past Bulloch County’s own department. WTOC reported crews from 12 counties worked the fire alongside Georgia Forestry Commission rangers. That is an unusually wide mutual aid call for a fire that started in a few hundred acres of pine flatwoods.

Much of that muscle is unpaid. Bulloch County officials said a large share of its firefighters are volunteers who have now given days of their own time to the fire line, on top of whatever job or family was waiting at home.

County officials thanked the GFC’s ground and air teams for their expertise and singled out Bulloch County Fire Department for staying on the fire through a week that has strained both agencies.

Neighbors have kept showing up with food and water for the crews. Officials are asking them not to drive into the fire area to deliver it. Anyone who wants to help is asked to coordinate through Bulloch County Fire Department representative Patricia Lanier Jones at 912-687-6293 or Bulloch County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Bubba Revell at 912-486-5926. They will arrange pickup outside the active zone.

Rain Arrives Sunday Night, Then 99 Degree Heat

A wetter break was expected Sunday night, but forecasters warned it would not last. The National Weather Service (NWS) office in Charleston, South Carolina covers the Bulloch County forecast area. It called for showers and thunderstorms likely mainly before 10 p.m. Sunday, with a 70% chance of rain. Rainfall of a quarter to half inch was possible, more where storms cluster.

Officials welcomed the rain but said it may not be enough on its own. Smoldering pockets inside the burn scar are expected to need heavier, sustained rain before they go out completely, which means smoke could keep hanging over the area for days.

Whatever falls Sunday night gives way fast to a heat wave.

Fire crews are due back on the line at 7 a.m. Monday, into a heat index near 104 that climbs toward 107 by Tuesday afternoon.

Smoke Will Outlast the Rain

Smoke will likely hang over the Brooklet area longer than the rain helps. Officials said pockets of the burn scar could keep smoldering until the region gets a real soaking, not just a passing storm, so haze is possible on some mornings even as containment climbs further.

State emergency managers are also tracking a below-normal 2026 Atlantic hurricane season forecast, a small mercy for a region still clearing downed timber from the last storm that came through.

Crews return to the fire line at 7 a.m. Monday, back into triple digit heat, on a blaze Bulloch County has now tried to call finished more than once.