2 massive fires light up Atlanta area’s early morning sky

Two massive fires in the Atlanta area sent flames and columns of smoke into the early morning sky Friday and prompted evacuations in at least one neighborhood.

One fire, at a southeastern Atlanta business that sells wooden pallets, caused the city’s fire department early Friday to evacuate several nearby houses, the department said.

The majority of the Pallet Depot’s yard of pallets was burning, and flames reached 100 feet into the air, CNN affiliate WSB reported, citing the Atlanta Fire Rescue Department.

Another enormous fire was consuming at least one structure early Friday in an industrial area in Cobb County, just outside northwestern Atlanta, not far from Interstate 285, aerial footage aired by CNN affiliates WGCL and WSB showed.

Details about that fire weren’t immediately available.

Authorities did not immediately release information about the fires’ causes or whether anyone was injured.

The fires come amid particularly dry conditions in Georgia and other parts of the US Southeast.

Atlanta and much of neighboring Cobb County are in a severe drought, and conditions are even worse in areas just to the north and south, the US Drought Monitor says.