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Farm fire
Firefighters battle a blaze that consumed a pole barn, metal farm building, hay bales and machinery on a farm about 4-1/2 miles southeast of Bartley Thursday night. Bartley Fire Chief Jim Morris preliminarily blamed the fire at the Doug Harsh farmstead on spontaneous combustion within the large square hay bales. Morris said about midnight that firefighters could not enter the buildings to investigate the cause. Its way too hot, Morris said. We cant put people in there to investigate. The fire was discovered between 8 p.m. and 8:30 p.m., and took firefighters from nine departments to bring under control. Morris said there wasn't much that firefighters could do with the fire, "besides babysit it," and protect nearby grain bins while nearly 1,000 bales in the wall-less pole shed and 40-50 bales and farm machinery in the enclosed metal shed burned and smoldered through the night. Providing manpower, fire trucks and water tankers were fire departments from Bartley, Indianola, Red Willow Western, Beaver Valley, Edison, Arapahoe, Wilsonville-Hendley, Holbrook and Cambridge. Cargill and Frenchman Cambridge Irrigation District trucks helped haul water, Morris said.