BUFFALO, N.Y. — An investigation is underway after first responders were called to fight nearly two dozen brush fires along train tracks in the City of Buffalo and Town of Tonawanda on Thursday evening.
The brush fires were mostly contained near the tracks, a Buffalo Fire spokesperson told 2 On Your Side.
"At this time it does not appear that either residents or businesses were affected," the city said in a statement, adding that no injuries were reported.
An investigation into the fires is ongoing, the spokesperson said Thursday night.
Firefighters also battled brush fires in the Town of Tonawanda, where mutual aid was necessary to keep all of the scenes under control because the areas they were working in were difficult to reach.
"We couldn't get down the tracks or down the other side, so we started cutting holes in fences and starting using the ATVs and shuttling water to them," Scott Plecha, fire chief of the Sheridan Park Fire Company, told 2 On Your Side on Thursday evening.
"In my career I haven't had that many amount of fires at once at the same time, so it was kind of difficult because I had command posts down here, and then I had chiefs running this fire, and then we were getting phone calls from dispatch saying you've got more fires going on the track, so I just had to keep adding chiefs and resources down the line."
Two firefighters suffered from heat exhaustion fighting the flames but did not require medical attention, Plecha said.