Let me guess - another planned "smart city" site
Wind-driven brush fire on New York's Long Island 50 percent contained. Firefighter injured
Associated Press
Updated Sat, March 8, 2025 at 5:26 PM CST·2 min read
405
1 / 3
Brush-Fires-New-York
This photo provided by the New York Air National Guard shows smoke from the fires in the Pine Barrens off Sunrise Highway in New York's Long Island, on Saturday, March 8, 2025. (Cheran Campbell/New York Air National Guard via AP)
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Fast-moving brush fires burned through a large swath of land on New York's Long Island on Saturday fanned by high winds, spewing thick gray smoke into the sky and prompting the evacuation of a military base and the closure of a major highway.
Officials said three of the four fires were fully contained while the other one, in Westhampton, was 50 percent contained. Two commercial buildings were partially burned, but officials said homes were not in the line of fire. One firefighter was flown to a hospital to be treated for burns to the face.
“Our biggest problem is the wind,” Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine said. “It is driving this fire.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a state of emergency and said state agencies were responding to the fires around the Pine Barrens, a wooded area that is home to commuter towns east of New York City.