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A BRAY family spent the weekend protecting their property as the huge blaze on Bray Head came perilously close to their home.
Margaret McGuinn, her husband Sean Murphy and their two children live in Windgates and were one of the homes closest to the fire at the weekend.
On Saturday, the family were told to prepare to evacuate but, fortunately, a timely water drop over the area from the Air Corps meant they didn’t have to leave their home.
‘ The fire came very, very close to us and it was very near the homes at the cliff-end of the road too. We are on the southern slopes of Bray Head. At 3.17 p.m. on Saturday, the fire came really close to us and we were told to prepare to evacuate but luckily the helicopter, which had just refuelled, arrived and did a water drop which helped quell the fire near us.’
Margaret said that although large parts of Bray Head were covered in thick smoke they were fortunate that the smell of smoke didn’t pervade their home all weekend.
‘Luckily the wind was blowing in a north-westerly direction this time so we didn’t have the smoke smell like we had in 1995. There were huge flames alright but the smoke was taken off in a different direction.’
Margaret said the entire family are exceptionally vigilant when fire breaks out along Bray Head.
‘We are always vigilant when a fire starts and we try to dampen down the area around us. There was a 10-minute period on Saturday which was very scary but thankfully we weren’t evacuated.
‘ The gardai, the fire services and the air corps were all fantastic. They worked tirelessly to get the fire under control and protect everyone.
‘It was a very long weekend. The fire actually started very far away from us but within an hour it had headed quickly towards us because the ground was so dry. My son and husband were out cutting down the long grass near our property and we were dampening down the area, as were all the neighbours. Everyone really pulled together.
‘ There are three houses in our area and we are the middle one. The fire came very close behind our house.
‘ This is definitely the worst fire I remember since 1995. The intensity of the fire just jumped part of Bray Head. The whole landscape now is like a smouldering lunar landscape. It’s still smoking. On Saturday night, when they thought it was all over, the fire erupted again around 4 a.m. but fortunately the fire service was still on the head and were able to dampen it down.
‘We are still keeping a close eye on it because of the smoul- dering. There’s still little pockets of flames every now and then. We are hoping for more rain and no strong winds.
‘The services were absolutely fantastic though. We are also very fortunate that we are by the sea so we had a source of water to fight the fire,’ Margaret said.