INTERLACHEN, Fla. — A wildfire continues to wreak havoc Wednesday morning in Putnam County causing a school to close and road closures. Multiple school bus routes are also canceled.
Ashleigh Rhodes sent this video to Action News Jax showing how bad the conditions were on State Road 20 before Florida Highway Patrol closed the roadway. *see below
Rhodes told Action News Jax she recorded the video at about 4 a.m. after leaving her job at Circle K in Palatka.
“I was headed home and thought, ‘this is crazy. I need to record this,’” she said. “It was horrible. I couldn’t see the lines in the road. I couldn’t see the [traffic] light until I was under it. Good thing it was green,” she added.
Traffic on SR 20 during that time was so bad it impacted Putman County firefighter’s response to a house fire.
“At 3:30am, crews responded to a working residential structure fire off of Cherokee Ave. in Interlachen,” Putnam County Fire Rescue stated in a social media post.
“District 72 arrived on scene to a fully involved home. Multiple units had increased difficulty responding due to zero visibility from the Pace Ct. Wildfire,” the post states.
Florida Highway Patrol eventually closed State Road 20 and Keuka Road. CR 315 to Lake Galilee (Johnson) was also closed around 6:30 a.m. due to near-zero visibility.
The smoked forced the closure of Robert H. Jenkins Jr. Elementary and Ochwilla Elementary and Melrose Elementary are parent drop off only.
Read: Heavy smoke from wildfires closes roads, school, bus route delays in Putnam County
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