From cbsnews.com:

(Note from Mark: We just returned yesterday from a funeral in Orlando and could see the smoke plumes from fires in Georgia coming from the ground and hazing the atmosphere in our flight path).

CBS/AP As a spreading wildfire in the Okefenokee Swamp neared her mobile home, Lynn Adams and her two grandchildren were roused at 1 a.m. Wednesday and told by sheriffs deputies to evacuate.

By sunrise, they were allowed to return home. The fire, however, continued to burn and a giant column of black smoke drifted over Adams yard, where flakes of black ash peppered the dry, brown grass. Adams watched a helicopter swoop down on a pond behind her home to refill its dangling bucket with water to dump on the blaze.

“Goodness gracious,” said Adams, 50, who lives in the tiny community of Astoria just north of the swamp. “Its a never-ending thing. Once it gets started, its hard to stop.”

Dozens of residents were forced to evacuate early Wednesday as the wildfire crossed a highway near the private, nonprofit Okefenokee Swamp Park and moved toward two communities south of Waycross. Ware County officials let them return home a few hours later.

The wildfire had blackened about 6,000 acres in the swamp since Tuesday evening, raising the total area burned to about 60,000 acres — or 93 square miles — of forest in southeast Georgia, said Eric Mosley, a spokesman for the Georgia Forestry Commission. Officials say 18 homes have been destroyed.

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