SC saw 32 wildfires Thursday

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WCBD) – The South Carolina Forestry Commission (SCFC) reported 32 wildfires across the state on Thursday.

Officials say the number is a “dramatic uptick” from normal and SCFC is urging people to use “extreme caution when burning outdoors.”

“Most of the state is just in a long drying pattern,” according to SCFC Fire Chief Darryl Jones. He explained that “when fuels are really dry, the heat released from outdoor burning can exacerbate the conditions that lead to fires escaping easily and spreading rapidly.”

Jones said that low relative humidity Thursday also made conditions ripe for fires.

Most fires in the state happened in the central and eastern regions of the state, “along both sides of the I-95 corridor throughout the coastal plain.”