County bans outdoor burning
Extended dry conditions, continued summertime temperatures and a busy day of firefighting have prompted local officials to enact a ban on all outdoor burning in Crittenden County until further notice.
Judge-Executive Fred Brown made the proclamation Tuesday morning, just one day after volunteer firefighters responded to three brush fires in the county. The ban was issued out of concern for safety.
“When it’s this dry, you don’t have much of a choice,” said Ronald “Red” Howton, Marion’s fire chief.
The ban became effective Monday. Ignoring the order could result in fines, even jail time for violators, said Sheriff’s Deputy Greg Rushing.
“It’s just too hot and dry to burn anything right now,” Orman Hunt, a volunteer with Crittenden Fire Department, said Monday.
A similar ban was put in place last year after a prolonged drought, but the last two months have been even drier than the same period in 2008, said weather watcher Brenda Underdown.
Monday’s brush fires were initially controlled burns that got out of hand in the dry conditions, Hunt said. No injuries or structural damage were reported from any of the blazes.
But a fire Monday afternoon at the intersection of Lone Star Road and Baker Lane in rural Crittenden County was the second time firefighters responded to the spot since Friday. Chairs, a gas can and water hose were seen at a debris site Monday when firefighters arrived once again. Deputy Don Perry said the vacant lot belonged to Kevin Little, and the officer said he is investigating why a second fire was started after Friday’s incident.
Another brush fire Monday at the home of James Duncan on Ky. 506 burned some old logs and underbrush, Hunt said, but was gotten under control relatively easily by firefighters. Some of those firemen had to leave the Baker Lane fire to assist on Ky. 506 before heading back to fully extinguish the fire on Little’s property.
Howton said a brush fire in Marion Monday spread to city-owned property off Old Piney Road from a nearby garbage burn. The leaves and brush smoldered most of the night.
Officials advise anyone disposing of foliage debris left by last week’s wind storm do so at either the city or county’s brush dump, which both allow free disposal of limbs, logs and other brush. Other trash should be left for garbage pick-up or taken to the convenience center.
Meantime, the ban on burning will remain in effect until the county experiences a minimum rainfall of two inches countywide within a 24-hour period, Brown’s order states. He may also choose to lift the ban at any time.
There is no rain forecast for the area in the coming week, according to the University of Kentucky Agricultural Weather Center.
Structure fires claim homes
Two structure fires were reported in rural Crittenden County and another inside the City of Marion over the past week. At least one of the fires is under investigation by the Kentucky State Police.
Firefighters from Caldwell Springs and Fredonia responded to a fire at the home of Jason and Jessica Rushing on Seven Springs Road in the southern part of the county at 1:46 a.m., last Thursday. Their home was in flames by the time firemen arrived. A Kentucky State Police investigator was on the scene Friday, but at press time there had been no report on how the blaze started.
The same night, a rental home on Brook Street was gutted by a fire that started around dusk. Marion firefighters extinguished the blaze, but the fire appeared to have destroyed most of the contents. Mary Pigg was the renter of the house, but was not home at the time the fire was first reported by a neighbor. Frederick Geno is the home’s onwner.
Howton said the fire appears to have started near an electrical outlet at the front of the home.
On Monday, a parts trailer caught fire at the site of Crittenden Coal Company on Baker Church Road (Ky. 365) just before noon. Firemen from Mattoon and Sturgis were able to control the fire, but were called back later that afternoon as the fire began to smolder once again smolder.

Late night deer hunt runs afoul of law
A couple of non-resident deer hunters tried to get more than a month's jump start on the rifle season Saturday night and ended up spending a few nights in the Crittenden County Detention Center.
County Deputy Greg Rushing and Conservation Officer Randy Conway were on routine patrol late Saturday night when they witnessed a red and silver Chevrolet pickup cross over from Livingston into Crittenden County and turn onto Phin Croft Road. Rays of light were being cast from the passenger window of the truck so the officers stopped the vehicle just before 10 p.m., on the rural county road.
Inside the pickup, the officers found a spotlight, two loaded .30-30 rifles, Jack Daniels whiskey, marijuana and Xanax.
The driver, Christopher John Cleveland, 29, of Birmingham, Ala., and passenger Marion Lewis Culberson, 37, of Piedmont, Ala., were both arrested and lodged in the county jail where they remained early Monday.
Culberson was charged with drinking in a public place and possession of marijuana. Cleveland was charged with possession of marijuana and having prescription medication not in its original container. Both were also charged with various hunting violations, including spotlighting.
Deputy Rushing's report says that the men told the officers that they were in Crittenden County for the archery deer season, hunting on leased property near the area where they were arrested.
The men's rifles, spotlight and pickup truck were seized and impounded.

Linemen keeping power on
When Larry Mattingly comes to town, he and his crew are often treated as heroes.
And it's no surprise, for these are the guys who turn the lights back on after Mother Nature has her way with an area. For nearly three decades, Mattingly has been following destructive weather patterns, helping to restore power as an electric power lineman.
"I've been called a storm chaser a few times over the last 28 years," he said Monday, at his home in Marion for rare break after spending the entire month of September on the road restoring power across the weather-battered South.
Mattingly, Michael Woods, Jared Champion and John Hayes, all Crittenden Countians who work as linemen for Hendrix Electric, left on the first day of September for Mississippi to repair damages from Hurricane Gustav, which made landfall in Houma, La., earlier that day. They spent most of the first two weeks of the month in the Magnolia State and Louisiana, but were destined to return to Kentucky only to undo what the winds from Hurricane Ike accomplished.
"I haven't been home very much," Mattingly said of his September.
Mattingly and the rest of the crew for the Clay-based electric company have been working their way across western Kentucky since the Sept. 14 wind storms from Ike. They even got to spend some time at home working in Marion, but by early this week had moved on to the Owensboro area repairing downed lines and poles. Whether on the Gulf Coast or close to home, though, they have endured dangerous work with deadly electricity amid long days.
"We work like 16, 18 hour days," he said.
After hopping from city to city in southern Mississippi, the worst of the recent work was in the marshes and bayous of coastal Louisiana where the Gustav blew ashore. Downed and even missing power lines, utility poles snapped like toothpicks and blown transformers were only part of the challenge. When the local crew wasn't floating on an airboat to change out poles and attach new lines above alligator-infested marshes, they ate and slept under a large tent set up for utility workers. They spent virtually the entire time in Houma outdoors in the muggy, humid heat of the swamplands.
But Mattingly and the others had their share of rewards.
Restoring power to hospitals and care facilities with people on breathing machines and other life-support systems are a priority for linemen rebuilding power grids after storms. In Houma, the same was true, and it often led to a lending hand from the very public the linemen were helping.
"There were people packing us food and money," Mattingly said. "We didn't take the money, of course, but a lot of times you didn't get to eat like you wanted, so the food was welcomed."
As Ike approached prior to landfall on Sept. 13, the crew was bused out of Houma to New Orleans for safety, and a couple of days in the Crescent City was a bit of a needed break for the men. However, the Hendrix crew had little to look forward to upon their return to Kentucky. The same day they left New Orleans for home, Sept. 14, Ike's lashing winds crossed western Kentucky, leaving the damage the crew continues to repair.
It's been a busy year for Hendrix lineman. Besides recent travels courtesy of Gustav and Ike, Mattingly spent a portion of December in Kansas City following an ice storm and another couple of weeks in Indiana.
"I've been all over the country," Mattingly said of his career as a lineman.
Until the next storm, he can only guess where his job will take him next.

World War II airman’s remains interred at Arlington
Howard Enoch III’s father is finally at rest with his fellow American heroes.
The remains of 2nd Lt. Howard “Cliff” Enoch Jr., were laid to rest Monday at Arlington National Cemetery outside of Washington, D.C. The World War II airman shot down in 1945 over Germany, was interred with full military honors, closing a 63-year chapter in the life of his son.
“It was remarkable,” Enoch said Tuesday over the phone from his Framingham, Mass., home. “It was something I’ve dreamed of all my life.”
Lt. Enoch, a Marion native who left college to become a fighter pilot with the U.S. Army Corps, was killed March 19, 1945, in a battle with Luftwaffe planes east of Leipzig, Germany. The 20-year-old was killed three months before his son was born, and his remains were left locked behind the Iron Curtain of Soviet-controlled Germany.
It was not until April of this year that the P-51D Mustang pilot’s remains were identified and arrangements made for their return to the United States. It was finally cause for rejoicing by a son who neither got to meet his father nor mourn beside his final resting place.
“You could have knocked me over with a feather,” said Enoch of the forensic discovery.
On Monday, he proudly took possession of the American flag draped over his father’s casket. He was joined at the Arlington service by 35 or so others – some family, some former members of his father’s 359th Fighter Squadron and even Jim Estes, commander of Marion’s American Legion Post 111.
“It was truly an amazing ceremony,” Enoch said.
Full honors for the Crittenden County native included a horse-drawn caisson, a full Army band unit, an escort platoon, a flyover by two propeller-driven aircraft, a traditional 21-gun salute by a seven-man firing party and a lone bugler playing taps.
“It was the end of one phase, not knowing exactly where he was,” Enoch explained, describing his feelings after the funeral. “But the beginning of something else. I can now go anytime I want to visit his grave.”
Tired and weary from emotion, Enoch regrets only that his mother, Margarite, was unable to see her first husband laid to rest.
Floyd “Rip” Wheeler, one of Lt. Enoch’s running mates around Marion as a youth, recalled Monday that his buddy never backed down from a fight, even when overmatched. He also recalls discussing their plans as teens to join the military effort as World War II dragged on.
“He said he didn't want to walk, he wanted to fly,” Wheeler said with a chuckle. “I didn't want to fly, I wanted to walk.”
Enoch will get to meet Wheeler and others who remembered his father when a service honoring the airman is held next month at Marion United Methodist Church.