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A bunch of people emailed to ask if we knew what was going on with that huge cloud of smoke visible over Brooklyn. One of our Gothamist Contribute commenters answers: "There is a brush fire in Great Kills Park That is in Staten Island for those who don't know." NY1 is reporting that the fire is pretty large, but no one has been injured.
Picture of the fire taken from the elevated F Train line near Coney Island, from Bluejake.
UPDATE: NY1 got an article up about the fire-- still no indication of damage to nearby homes.
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According to reports on Channel 7, the fire was acutally in the New Jersey Meadowlands, blowing such dense smoke across the Turnpike and Amtrak's Main Line that the road was closed and rail service suspended. Confirmation of the location comes from the problems of several AM radio stations (including WNYC-AM) whose transmitters are in the fire zone.
There was a fire in New Jersey Friday night. It was in Kearny, and it shut down the Turnpike and Northeast Corridor for a while. It was caused by a car fire on the Turnpike. It is what Harry Matthews seems to be talking about.
The Staten Island fire is totally different, as it happened on Saturday and put people's homes at risk. The five-alarm brush fire in Great Kills Park was brought under control this evening. Here is a story from Channel 7 where you can see they reported the fire was in Staten Island.
My guess is that Harry Matthews must have confused Staten Island with New Jersey (not hard given the geography and the legend it was won in a boat race against New Jersey) or confusing Friday night with Saturday night.
Maybe this was added after the link was posted to the NY1 story, but here's the pertinent paragraph:
About two dozen homes were evacuated, and about 75 acres of brush were burned but there were no reports of any significant property damage.
So thank goodness for that.
I hope they investigate the source of the fire. I observed it from the JFK airport long term lot. Usually a brush fire needs a lot of wind to get moving, it was pretty calm. What I don't like is that it's 3-11, it seems like a lot happens on the eleventh of a month (like WTC, Madrid, London)
Larry
There were reports on the news last night of some houses getting their siding melted. I am guessing it is tacky suburban vinyl siding from the various accounts and the fact that it is Staten Island.
Considering the fire in Staten Island and its racial problems, you would have thought it was a cross burning.