This week crews have been busy with many brush fire calls with five or six fire departments out on Tuesday battling with brush fires across the county, including Godfrey Lane, Hollidaysburg, and Moser Road in Antis Township.

“There seems to be more today — it is very dry right lately and with the wind it does not take much for a fire to start spreading,” Taylor said.

He said the locations of two of the fires was in Antis and Frankstown townships.

“People just need to refrain from burning whenever possible,” Taylor said.

A firefighter from Phoenix Volunteer Fire Company waters hotspots at a brushfire in the backyard of 107 Godfrey Lane in Hollidaysburg. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

Accuweather Senior meteorologist Bob Larson said the current conditions are caused by the dry and hot summer, and the below average rainfall in September and October.

“Over the past few days, there was a large upper level area of high pressure that pushed the just stream up north, which blocked any storms from bringing in precipitation and caused unseasonably warm temperatures,” he said.

However, this is about to change because of tropical storm Nicole that is predicted to make landfall on the East Coast of Florida as a category 1 hurricane late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning according to Accuweather.com.

Larson said, the storm will make its way up through the southeast and to the northeast.

They are expecting 2 to 4 inches of rain from Nicole on Friday.

“That alone will not help with the dryness accumulated from the previous months, but it will help with the brush fires for a little bit,” Larson said.

Mirror staff writer Cati Keith can be reached 814-946-7535.