Campfire Ban Lifted for Toms River Area

After the much-needed rain soaked the area all Sunday, New Jersey Forest Fire Service officials have lifted the ban on open fires.

The rain helped ease the season's extremely dry conditions somewhat, according to New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection officials.

"The campfire ban has been lifted all throughout the state," said DEP spokesman Robert Considine.

The rains predicted for Ocean County for the remainder of the week will make a difference in preventing forest fires, DEP spokesman Larry Ragonese said.

"It would eliminate, at least in the short term, the very dry conditions that have been evident in our forests for the past several months," he said.

Still, one day of heavy downpour cannot erase this year's virtually snowless winter and a very dry spring, Ragonese said.

"From the forest fire perspective, and from the water supply perspective, this type of rain is what we need," he said. "Long-term though, we don't know what this rain means. We haven’t had much of any real precipitation; the state climatologists have said that we had one of the dryest springs and winters on record."

Toms River Fire Co. No. 1 issued its own alert that the campfire ban had been lifted. In town, brush fires were reported off Old Freehold Road, and near Skyview Park off Vaughn Avenue.

New Jersey firefighters had to battle more than 500 fires just in the last six weeks, Ragonese said. The fires included a recent blaze in town , which burned 20 acres, and that same week, which resulted in damage to the Gables Inn and one of the buildings belonging to Surflight Theatre.

In comparison, there were 750 wildfires in New Jersey in all of 2011.