Transient shack fire menaces Brentwood-Darlington homes

A brush fire along the Springwater Corridor Trail, near S.E. 81st Avenue and Harney Street, put houses in danger for a time, in the southeast corner of the Brentwood-Darlington neighborhood on Thursday, July 25.

When the first of six Portland Fire & Rescue (PF&R) crews, from five stations, plus mutual-aid crews from Clackamas Fire District 1, arrived minutes after the first calls to 9-1-1, they found a roaring field fire crackling swiftly toward homes nearby.

A PF&R Battalion Chief told THE BEE that, when crews arrived, “transients were trying to put out a fire burning a lean-to shack on the trail’s right-of-way – but the fire had already spread to dry grass in the area.”

As soon as firefighters arrived, the transients scattered, the Chief said.

The shack and its contents were totally consumed by the fire that was quickly sweeping toward a row of nearby homes.

The responding firefighters battled to keep the flames from reaching them, and their efforts proved successful.

There were no reported injuries. The cause of the original fire in the shack which sparked off the brushfire has not been determined.