A $200,000 forestry machine was lost to a fire yesterday as crews with the Caribou Fire and Ambulance Department and Maine Forest Service battled the blaze.
The department received word at 1 p.m. Monday of a fire around 408 East Road in New Sweden. Because the fire was not accessible from the road, the crew needed to use eight utility vehicles with pumping capabilities to reach the scene.
“It was off-road, so we had to use our UTVs to get in there with a fire hose provided by the forest service,” Caribou Fire and Ambulance Chief Brian Lajoie said. “So we were pumping water into the scene to extinguish the fire.”
Firefighters used more than 1,000 gallons of water to extinguish the flames, according to the department.
The machine was a feller buncher, which is used to cut and stack trees, and was operating at the time of the fire, LaJoie said.
It was owned by Dylan Bois of DB Logging and Son LLC in Frenchville.
Though the fire occurred in a heavily wooded area, it did not spread far beyond the equipment.
“It didn’t travel into the woods, and stayed with the machine,” he said. “So we were lucky there.”
The Maine Forest Service is investigating the fire.
