Alaska's wildland fire season officially started April 1st and Division of Forestry & Fire Protection (DOF) burn permits are now required on all State, municipal and private lands that do not have a local burn permit program in effect. The small-scale burn permits are good for burning one brush pile, using one burn barrel or the burning of maintained lawn. Large-scale permitting is available for any burning not covered under the small-scale permit and has more stringent requirements like a site inspection, additional people, water or heavy equipment. Brush pile burning and the use of burn barrels are two of the leading sources of human-caused wildland fires in Alaska. Each year as the snow rapidly melts, the dead grass and brush in yards and around burn barrels can dry out within just a few short hours of sunlight and become extremely flammable.  

A massive fire that broke out Tuesday morning is now considered under control Tuesday afternoon, authorities say. The blaze began around 5 a.m. at the Johnson Motor Lines warehouse on Lehigh Drive, on the bank of the Lehigh River. Hazmat crews were on the scene because there are chemicals in the building. A medical waste facility is located there. Northampton County Emergency Management Services is at the scene and officials from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection is at the site performing air quality tests. Fire officials are concerned about water runoff into the nearby Lehigh River and are monitoring the situation right now. Northampton County officials later said there was no shelter-in-place issued related to the fire.  

VIDEO: There have been countless stories of selflessness and heroism after Friday's tornado. Among all that hard work, it's important to stop and recognize them. In this case, that wasn't hard to spot— as the source of that selflessness was wearing Little Rock Fire Department badge. "I wouldn't trade you guys for anything," LRFD Chief Delphone Hubbard said. "Good, bad, or indifferent, we're still family, and I'm super, super proud of them." When the storm hit West Little Rock on Friday afternoon, many sprang into action— including the crew at LRFD Station Nine. "At 2:25, we are walking out of an office to a very heavily damaged fire station," LRFD Captain Ben Hammond said. Hammond is the Shift Captain of Truck Nine, based at Station Nine. Like many, he kept an eye on the skies on Friday, which was almost a bad decision.  

Sheriff's investigators in Orange County are working to track down those involved in an incident where a driver did donuts around a fire truck that was responding to a call. The incident, captured on video, happened Sunday morning around 1 a.m. at the intersection of Sand Lake Road and Winegard Road, near the Florida Mall. Orange County Fire Rescue was responding to a call of a car fire at that location. When firefighters arrived, instead of finding flames, they found a big crowd of people hanging out. Firefighters called the sheriff's office, and deputies arrived about five minutes later, the crowd took off. In the video, which was posted to Instagram. you can see an Orange County firetruck being circled by a car doing burnouts in the middle of the intersection. If you look closely, you can see two people hanging outside of the car.  

With jobs as intense as first responders have, some can experience thoughts of self-harm. That's why the president of the Georgia Association of Fire Chiefs is now promoting a video aimed at preventing the loss of life for those that protect us on a daily basis. "Thank you for having me. First of all, there's PTSD, which is commonly heard throughout all of our society, but it seems to be on the grow in public safety as a whole, whether that's fire, police, EMS or 911," President of the Georgia Association of Fire Chiefs, David Eddins said. "And ultimately, the worse side effect of PTSD is suicide. And we are seeing that the numbers aren't accurate because it's not being reported as that with public safety. But it only takes to getting in a group of public safety officials from around the state or around the country, and bring that subject up and you'll hear me too."