Train sparks quarter-mile brush fire along Port of Tacoma Road, damages utility poles
Aug 24, 2026, 3:14 PM
Tacoma Fire Department (TFD) crews put out brush fire along Port of Tacoma Road on Monday. (Courtesy of Tacoma Fire Department)
(Courtesy of Tacoma Fire Department)
A passing train sparked a brush fire along Port of Tacoma Road on Monday, keeping Tacoma Fire Department (TFD) crews busy during an already dangerously dry stretch across the region.
The fire broke out between SR 509 and Marshall Avenue, burning through a quarter mile of dry brush within a roughly 10-foot-wide median and damaging two utility poles, according to TFD Spokesperson Chelsea Shepherd.
“The idea that it was simply a train going down the train track, and that was enough that whatever was going on with that train, that was enough to at least spark the dry brush that was in that little 10-foot median for a quarter mile,” Shepherd told KIRO Newsradio. “We definitely want people to know that it is very dry out there. We hope people are at least being very careful with the preventable piece of this, right? We don’t want people throwing cigarettes out the windows, and this is just evidence of how dry it really is.”
Port of Tacoma Road was closed until approximately 2 p.m. while crews extinguished the flames and mopped up hot spots.
“Trucks use that a lot,” Shepherd said. “I know that it was backed up pretty far.”
Tacoma Public Utilities (TPU) dispatched crews to the scene to evaluate the damage to the two poles and to determine if they will need to be repaired or replaced, Shepherd said.
No injuries were reported.
This was one of several brush fires to which crews responded in Tacoma on Monday.
Across the state, wildfires have burned nearly one million acres.
Frank Lenzi is the News Director for KIRO Newsradio. Read more of his stories here.
