1 day Ago By John Lauritsen
With Monday's warm and dry weather , red flag warnings have been issued throughout Minnesota. Twenty-seven counties are considered at risk for fires due to wind and low humidity. "We turned our 50-acre hobby farm into a pizza farm," said Emily Knudsen.
Pleasant Grove Pizza Farm near Waseca is a place where Knudsen and her husband, Bill Bartz, hold classes and teach people how to cook in their wood fire ovens. That's what they were doing during a March day last year when they noticed smoke — not coming from their ovens but from outside. "I knew that was not a brushfire when I went and looked," said Bartz.
"I think they said Findley Marsh was on fire, and it's coming right towards your place." What worried them most was how fast the wildfire gained steam — growing from embers and smoke to a five-alarm response in a matter of minutes. The only thing standing between the fire and their farm was dozens of acres of dry grass.
"Amazing and scary," said Knudsen. "People in the class were nervous, wondering 'do I stay or do I go?' Just not wanting to get stuck in a position where they couldn't get out, right?" Knudsen was also trying to figure out how to evacuate her farm animals. But then things changed.
Just as quickly as the fire started and was heading right for Pleasant Grove, the wind suddenly shifted and pushed the fire in a completely different direction. "At that point, I started to calm down a little bit," said Bartz. The wildfire eventually died off, but it got Knudsen and Bartz's attention.
It's the first, and hopefully the last, time they experience something like that. "Yeah, I think we're good. We're good for a long time," Knudsen said.
That fire burned hundreds of acres, and it destroyed an abandoned home and damaged outbuildings in the area. John Lauritsen is an Emmy award-winning reporter from Montevideo, Minn. He joined WCCO-TV in late-July of 2007.
Two days after he started, the Interstate 35W bridge collapsed..
