RUMFORD – Firefighters battled a 10-alarm forest fire late Friday that investigators believe may have been set.

Fifty firefighters from 10 towns and a Maine Forest Service helicopter contained a forest fire that started about 4 p.m. off the Whippoorwill Road, which is off Routes 2 and 5 at Rumford Point. The fire was about halfway up Whippoorwill Road.

Hot, dry and windy conditions were blamed for more than a dozen wildfires that burned through forests, brush and grasslands across the state.

By 8 p.m., firefighters in Rumford were still trying to dig a ditch around the fire’s perimeter of about nine acres of cut-over hardwood and softwood on a steep hill.

“It’s under control, but there’s some extensive mop up that needs to be done,” Rumford Deputy Chief Scott Holmes said about 7 p.m. “They’re still up there doing knockdown.”

Holmes said when the first crews arrived they tried to flank the 200-foot wide fire area, but the wind quickly blew it into a larger conflagration.

“I thought we could get a handle on it, but it quickly outran us and we stopped and got better organized,” Holmes said. “I called for a lot of help right away when the call came in, but as soon as we got on scene, that’s when we called out pretty much all of northern Oxford County.”

Maine Forest Service Ranger Jay Bernard said burn conditions were perfect for a large forest fire, with wind coming in out of the west to fan the flames up the hill’s rugged west-southwest slope.

“We had a flame height that exceeded 30 feet. The fire took a nice charge up the hill,” Bernard said.

Once the fire reached the summit, the helicopter dropped four sorties of water from the Ellis River on it, stopping it, Holmes said.

While the helicopter attacked it from above, firefighters were driven up both sides of its flanks by all-terrain vehicles and pickup trucks on two woods roads.

2 acres an hour

Bernard said the fire burned an acre every 30 minutes.

“The cause is still under investigation, but right now it looks to be very suspicious,” he added.

Crews had to connect 600 feet of fire hose to pump water from the Ellis River and provide several tanker trucks with a steady supply of water for firefighters on the hill.

Holmes said there were five firefighters per company from the towns of Rumford, Mexico, Andover, Peru, Dixfield, Canton, Roxbury, Byron, Newry and Bethel.

Med-Care Ambulance provided several EMTs and paramedics to ensure that firefighters stayed hydrated. They also provided personnel to free up some firefighters, Holmes added.

Two Salvation Army Emergency Disaster Services canteen trucks loaded with food and drinks arrived at 7:45 p.m. from Lewiston and Portland.

Holmes said he intended to keep a company of firefighters atop the hill all night to make sure it doesn’t flare up again. There were no injuries.

Earlier in the day, a grass fire that spread from a permitted burn was quickly doused before it could cause any damage.

The fire, at the home of Mike Thibodeau at the corner of Route 2 and Andover Road, was reported to the Rumford Fire Department at 10:30 a.m.

Holmes said it started in three small pits near the house. One of them got away when the wind came up. It jumped from the pit to the lawn, then to a field to the edge of the woods. The house was threatened, said Holmes, but the fire was extinguished before there was any damage the property.

He said about an acre of lawn and field and a few trees were destroyed before the 20 or so firefighters responded from Rumford and Mexico.

He said Thibodeau did all the right things before starting the burn. He had hand tools and a water supply nearby.

State problem

The Maine Forest Service reported at least 14 new wildfires around the state. There were three separate blazes in the Aroostook County town of Monticello, including a fire that tore through an abandoned building.

In Houlton, a grass fire quickly spread across 50 acres before forest rangers and fire crews brought flames under control.

Other wild fires were reported in Howland, Argyle, Hartford, Starks, Unity, Linneus, Presque Isle, Columbia and Columbia Falls.

Fire officials said hot temperatures and strong wind gusts caused small fires to quickly burn into big ones. Forest rangers were urging all property owners to refrain from open burning during late morning to late afternoon hours.

Some municipal fire departments were ordering bans on all outdoor burning. In Lewiston, hot, dry and breezy conditions Friday prompted fire officials to ban all outdoor burning for at least the weekend.

Fire Chief Michel Lajoie said fire danger remained high this week and there was no sign of relief in sight. Weather officials were calling for continued heat and wind for most of the weekend.

“Even the rain we’ve had, it didn’t do enough,” Lajoie said.

No fire permits will be issued for outdoor burning until the conditions change, according the chief. He was recommending that people have their brush and debris picked up instead of trying to burn it.