On Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the request of a contractor clearing woodland for a housing development project, the Chestertown Volunteer Fire Company assisted with the prescription burn of natural waste material. Because of the size of the primary or main pile, the Kent County Health Department had requested fire suppression units stand by while the burn is started. (The Kent County Health Department regulates all “Open Burning” in the county.)
The location of the burn, i.e., the new development… Is at the end of Talbot Boulevard, off Morgnec Road (Maryland 291 “Chestertown Bypass”.) The job site is extremely large, with most of it not immediately visible from publicly accessible surrounding locations. The pile to be burned is in terrain which could be considered a valley, rare in this part of the county.
Because this is a work site and given the ground condition because of recent snow and rain, it was decided bringing heavy fire equipment “off-road” was inappropriate. That left our choice of fire suppression equipment as Brush Trucks only.
Communicating with our Fire Chief, John “Otis” Darling ahead of time, the contractor had prepared the main or primary pile in such a way as to facilitate quick and efficient ignition. Once the pile has consumed itself to a reasonable size, the contractor will, on their own without the fire company present, continue adding material using a tracked loader and a tracked excavator. If there is sufficient set-back distance (there is) and no natural combustible material (dry grass & weeds) to carry fire to nearby natural cover (there is… it’s just dirt from the pile to the existing wood line), and there is equipment available to suppress any fire that may get out… it’s a completely routine and accepted practice to allow contractors the ability to burn material unsupervised. These conditions must be met before the Kent County Health Department will issue a burning permit.
The contractor has been provided with the business telephone number for Kent Central Dispatch, and Chief Darling’s cell phone number, in case a question comes up. The contractor was also instructed that if the highly unlikely and unthinkable were to happen and they are not able to contain a problem? Immediately call 9-1-1 and summon help. Again, this is a completely routine practice, which happens all the time here and around the entire country. We only mention it because in this case, we were asked to help. Most of the time, the contractors handle all the arrangements and perform the prescription burn unsupervised. They are, however, required to notify the county dispatch center prior to starting the burn, and when they are finished for the day. Given the amount of materials that need disposal, the contractor will be performing this prescription burn for at least the next week or two, and possibly longer.
It’s unlikely… but still possible… for the public to see smoke from this prescription burn. Visible fire may also be seen through leafless trees from the nearby communities of Coventry Farms and Crestview. Additionally, residents of these communities may occasionally experience the “smell of smoke” from this burn. If you think there is a real problem, we encourage calling 9-1-1 to report it. We’d rather come out to find everything is OK, then not respond to a problem that could or would get even bigger before intervention.
As a reminder and cautionary measure, the contractor has placed “PRESCRIBED BURN AHEAD” signage at the intersection of Morgnec Road (Maryland 291 – Chestertown Bypass) and Talbot Boulevard. It is visible to traffic traveling in both directions on 291.
And finally… We’d like to extend a special Thank You to the Kennedyville VFC and Galena VFC. As our brush truck (Brush 6) is out-of-service, they each graciously provided a brush truck so we could help this contractor.
