Bon, I imagine that rumor is true. I heard that Oklahoma County sent a Task Force to help them, at the request of the Logan County emergency management people. County Task Forces usually pull 1 truck each, along with personnel to man that truck, from various departments within a specific county. That allows a county to send some help without stripping them entirely of personnel and trucks they may need to fight fires in their own county. There have been and still are many fires today, but that one just may be the worst one in terms of the struggle to contain it. I hope everyone stays safe and that no further structures are lost. Our wind speed here has really dropped in the last hour and I hope the wind speeds in the rest of the state are dropping as well. Dawn

Not as far as I know. It is sort of hit and miss in this state. I have about a dozen different ways I try to catch the latest fire news and post it here if I think any of our forum members have wildfire and/or evacuations near them. One way to see the location of very large fires is on one of the websites that show you the NOAA Satellite Fire Detection data. They analyze the satellite data and put a 'dot' on the map to show the location of each fire. My DH and I commonly refer to it as the dot map. Unfortunately, the fires have to be big before they show up on the dot map, so it won't have fires that have just broken out in the last half-hour or hour. I'll link the dot map below. It updates frequently, but because it is based on analyzed data, there's always a little bit of a time lag. If you are checking it often during the day, remember to hit refresh so it pulls up the latest data. You can check with your county's Emergency Management Director to see if he or she has any way that they routinely send out news alerts, including breaking news of fires or tornadoes or whatever. Ours sends out such alerts on Nixle.us and anyone can sign up to get them. Some counties that maintain a county website put fire news on their website---at least during business hours. Some fire departments do the same, and some fire departments and emergency management directors use Twitter or Facebook to alert their citizens of fires in the area. If there is a fire in your area and you are pretty sure it is in your county, sometimes you can go to radioreference.com and use it like a scanner to listen to your county's fire channel (if it is available for Web audio listening) on radioreference.com. There's also a smartphone app at that website. I used that website last week to track the fires in Cleveland County when our firefighters were up there helping fight them. Not all counties are available via radioreference, but many of them are. For large, ongoing multiday fires, you can go to the Oklahoma Forestry Services webpage and check the daily wildfire situation report at both the state level and the higher areas, like the southern area or the national inciweb system. Sometimes, on bad wildfire days, the NWS offices will put up radar with the current smoke plumes from large fires circled on them to show us where they are. Also, at the request of local county emergency officials, the NWS will issue a Fire Warning (different from a Red Flag Fire Warning) in the case of evacuations. When they do this, the alert feature on your weather radio sounds to alert you and is followed by an evacuation message. I also use the different local media websites. Most of the TV stations in central and northeastern OK get fire news up really quickly, usually with live streaming reports including video footage from a chopper. Often I click on KOCO or KFOR and first learn of a fire there, and then start hitting other websites to pick up the latest news. If we lived in Texas, they have a Google map feature on their Texas Forest Service website that shows working fires, their size and the amount of containment. It is really handy, but we don't have it here. I use it to track fires near me but across the river, since I am surrounded by Texas on three sides. Some counties have a reverse-9-1-1 system that calls homeowners and warns them of hazards, including dangerous weather and fire evacuations. So, as you can see, there's lots of way you may be able to find the news, but it is not necessarily easy. The dot map is linked below. It is the NOAA Satellite Fire Detection site and is available via OKFIRE via the OKMesonet. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: NOAA Satellite Fire Detection Site

Bumping this down.

Get some other bids, but be prepared to pay anywhere from 1/4, to 1/3 to 1/2 up front at the start of the job....... Do you build a house with nothing down and no money of your own up front? Any customer of mine that is not willing to put THEIR money up fromt gets the "Hey it's been REAL nice visiting with ya, but I think my NEXT available date will be on February 30th of NEXT year.... See Ya" Does that make sense? People that WANT something, but do not want to front ANY of their money - don't need 'em... don't want 'em.... There's PLENTY of folks out there that understand how the "drill" is done.. I have been working with them since 1978...... Not trying to bust your chops on the money issue - but the old saying is true - "IF you've got the GREEN - I'll be on the SCENE" Clearly the guy that came to your house and kicked Fluffy's Litter box is a bit "lacking" in his interpersonal skills. Get some more bids.... but be prepared for a gut check when it comes to paying SOMETHING up front... IMHO only idiots or guys that don't know any better (ie; NO prior business or trade experience) will work for zero money up front, and that is NOT how I roll...... just my .02 cents worth as a contractor for over 31 years kevin