About Our District
Cowley County Fire District IV was formed in 1980 and is an all volunteer fire department that protects all of Maple, Ninnescah and Rock Township in Cowley County, Kansas. We also protect 12 sections of Gore Township in Sumner County and 6 sections of Fairview Township in Cowley County. The total size of our fire district is 132 square miles and a population of 2,600 people.
We have 20 active volunteers and work out of two stations. Our main station is located in Udall and we have a sub station in Rock. We currently have 1 engine, 1 combination engine/tanker, 1 tanker, 1 pumper, 1 rescue and 3 grass rigs.
Outdoor Burning
Outdoor burning in the unincorporated portions of Cowley County Fire District IV requires authorization before the burning is to take place. To receive authorization for any type of outdoor burning in Cowley County you must call the Winfield 911 Center at (620)221-5447. To receive authorization for any type of outdoor burning in Sumner County you must call the Sumner County 911 Center at 620-326-2884.
Outdoor burning in the city limits of Udall is prohibited.
If weather conditions are favorable, you will receive authorization for your burn. You must also follow the guidelines below while conducting an outdoor burn.
Automatic Aid Agreements
Our fire district has Automatic Mutual Aid Agreements for structure fires with Winfield, Arkansas City, Mulvane, Atlanta and Belle Plaine.
Automatic aid allows our departments to have enough resources on the initial alarm to safely extinguish a structure fire.
For structure fires in our district west of 61st rd, Mulvane, Belle Plaine and Winfield are automatically dispatched to our incident; east of 61st rd Winfield and Atlanta are automatically dispatched.
We are automatically dispatched on all structure fires in Belle Plaine and Mulvane’s fire districts. We are dispatched on structure fires inside the city limits of Winfield and on structure fires in Winfield’s fire district west of 111th. We respond to all structure fires in Arkansas City’s fire district. We are dispatched to structure fires in Atlanta’s fire district west of 151st.
General Guidelines for Outdoor Burning
The following guidelines were established by K.A.R. 28-19-47(e) and are to
be followed when conducting any outdoor burning operation within Cowley County, Kansas.
- Burning is not otherwise prohibited by any local jurisdiction of authority.
- Burning of materials that produce heavy smoke, such as oils, tires, and tarpaper is prohibited.
- Burning shall take place only during daylight hours and shall not be started until at least one hour after sunrise however, burning to create firebreaks is permitted during early morning hours to take advantage of calm wind conditions.
- Burning is prohibited during foggy days or cloudy days with a ceiling of less than 2000 feet.
- Burning is restricted to periods when surface wind speed is more than 5 miles per hour and 15 miles per hour, and from a direction which will not carry smoke over any occupied dwelling or public roadways or over any airports within two miles of the burning site.
- Burning within 1000 feet of a roadway shall take place only after appropriate notification to the highway patrol, sheriff’s office, or other appropriate authorities, in order to avoid potential traffic safety hazards.
- The area to be burned is at least 1000 feet from any occupied dwelling and at least one mile from any airport.
- The burning operation is supervised until the fire is extinguished.