Not knowing when first responders would arrive to begin putting out the blazes, the homeowners decided to pool their own resources to fight the fires together.
Chris Hinkelmann, a Sinton resident, saw the flames and smoke rising from the brushy area behind his house, just feet from his property, when he went into his backyard at about 3 p. Storms of dust swirled through the air, and thick, black smoke poured into the neighborhood.
The residents heard popping sounds like firecrackers. Soon, the residents saw that the fires had reached the brush line and flared up to the top of the trees.
He and his neighbor were spraying their yard and house when one of the city trucks caught fire, he said. Hinkelmann called the fire department, but refrained from calling , not wanting to divert resources from the city trucks that had driven to the northwest, where the fires were known to have started, he said.
The local school district sent school buses to evacuate people. A block away, his neighbor, a former volunteer firefighter, had begun pulling out fire hoses at the intersection of East Welder Street and North Kohler Avenue, he said. Wearing pajamas, shorts and a pair of slip-on Converse All-Stars, he grabbed the supplies and walked toward the brush line, meeting three other neighbors at the corner.
