DUI crash starts fire in Mead

Two fires Thursday in the Mead area showed just how easily vegetation can ignite in this summer’s hot and dry conditions. Shortly before 10 p.m., a man suspected of driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol veered off East Stoneman Road near North Mapleleaf Lane, wedging his Dodge Challenger in a tangle of thick brush and pine trees that eventually caught fire. Capt. Greg Anderson, of Spokane County Fire District 9, said the man tried to back up, possibly spinning his wheels so fast that the friction ignited pine needles on the ground. Or, Anderson said, the cause was an overheating catalytic converter. The man reportedly was uninjured and taken away in a deputy’s patrol car. Firefighters knocked down the fire before it reached power lines overhead. Earlier in the day, around 1 p.m., a hot component in a riding lawnmower scorched an alfalfa field and a fence at a property off Peone Road, Anderson said. “The fire itself really was very small, but it had potential,” he said. State officials recently issued tight restrictions on the use of power tools in certain areas now that fire danger is listed as “extreme” in many parts of Eastern Washington.