A massive York County park will be on fire this afternoon. Here’s what to know
When passers by see one of York County’s biggest assets on fire this afternoon, it shouldn’t cause alarm.
The county sent a notice Monday that a large controlled burn will happen today at Catawba Bend Preserve. The 1,900-acre park off Neely Store Road, on the Rock Hill side of the Catawba River where it bends, is in the preparation process for eventual public access.
The land is largely pine forest. It was for years owned by a paper company and wasn’t thinned. The controlled burn Monday is designed to protect the park from future wildfires.
About 300 acres of the park will be burned during a three-year period through a series of controlled burns. The first one is about 75 acres along the gravel road entrance to the property, off Neely Store Road. It should burn away thick pine straw, fallen limbs, dead brush and debris that can spark wildfires.
Bulldozers cut a wide firebreak around the burn area last month. Today’s burn should end at sunset. Fire and emergency response units have been notified.
“We’ll patrol the lines,” Roy Boyd with Associated Land Management said in a county release Monday. “Once the burning is over with you’re going to have some stuff smoking out here. Stump holes, old stumps, downed trees and things like that. Anything close to the firebreak that has the potential to cross over the firebreak, we’ll take care of that.”
Weather is a main factor in the decision to burn Monday. The county got notice Sunday night that conditions would be good to go on Monday.
York County bought the Catawba Bend property for $21 million in 2018. The county envisions a nature preserve with paddling, hiking, camping and other recreational options at a $52 million mix of local, state, federal and private funding in the next 15 years.
