New Jersey-New York wildfire keeps burning, fed by dry, windy conditions

By Brendan O'Brien and Rich McKay

(Reuters) - Strengthening winds and bone-dry conditions were hindering firefighters working to gain control of a stubborn wildfire burning in a forested stretch along the New York-New Jersey state border about 50 miles (80 km) northwest of New York City.

The Jennings Creek Fire, which straddles the border between Passaic County, New Jersey, and New York's Orange County, has torched some 5,000 acres (2,023 hectares) of brush and thick woodland near Greenwood Lake and killed a park employee.

The blaze, which started late last week, was 20% contained, the New Jersey Forest Fire Service said on Tuesday on Facebook. The cause of the fire was undetermined.

The conditions will "create turmoil, chaos and lot of uncertainty that we don't need right now," New York Governor Kathy Hochul said during a news conference near the site of the fire. She said some 15 blazes were burning in her state in an unusually busy wildfire season.

New York State Police and National Guard helicopters were dumping water on the blaze, while more than 375 firefighters established fire lines to protect homes and contain the blaze. No structures were being threatened on Tuesday, but some residents in the rural area had evacuated, Hochul said.

The National Weather Service issued a Red Flag warning that included parts of New York, New Jersey. Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. It said wind gusts were expected to reach 45 miles (72 km) per hour with humidity levels around 20% in the region.

"The chances for more rain are not looking good for the next week or so," said William Churchill, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland.

Conditions are only expected to get slightly better on Wednesday, he said, with winds expected to taper off.

The region is in the middle of one of the driest autumns on record. It received its first measurable precipitation since mid-September on Monday, giving firefighters some, but brief, relief.

"The conditions we're facing are still pretty dire," Hochul said, urging residents to avoid outdoor burning.

The fire was responsible for one death. New York state forest ranger volunteer Dariel Vasquez, 18, was killed by a falling tree while battling the fire on Saturday, officials said.

In New Jersey, 10 separate wildfires in different parts of the state burned over the past week, including one in Englewood Cliffs, across the Hudson River from uptown New York City, where haze was visible and the air smelled of smoke over the weekend.

Other New Jersey blazes were much smaller than the Jennings Creek fire and were largely contained, according to fire officials.

Northern New Jersey was upgraded to "extreme" fire danger on Tuesday. The southern third of the state was at "high," while Central New Jersey's danger was rated "very high," the state's forest service said on its website.

Wildfire outbreaks are a relatively common occurrence in the West, but the East Coast blazes are unusual. In California, firefighters have slowly gained on the 20,630-acre (8,350-hectare) Mountain Fire as it burned about 50 miles (80 km) northwest of Los Angeles. As of Tuesday, it was 48% contained.

(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Chicago, Rich McKay in Atlanta; Editing by Frank McGurty and Jonathan Oatis)