The city of Fritch, Texas, is under a boil water notice but that is “hard to do since many residents are without electricity and or gas,” Hutchinson County announced.Two firefighters for the Texas Panhandle city of Pampa, in Gray County, were treated for minor injuries sustained battling the blazes Monday night, Pampa Community Services Director Dustin Miller told CNN on Thursday.“As we keep a close eye on wildfires across the state, the safety of our fellow Oklahomans is the top priority,” he posted on X. Kevin Stitt has activated emergency response teams.
The 687 Reamer Fire burned more than 2,000 acres before merging into the Smokehouse Creek Fire Thursday.The Magenta Fire is also still burning and has seared 2,500 acres and is 65% contained.The Grape Vine Creek Fire has charred 30,000 acres and is 60% contained.The portion of the Smokehouse Creek Fire that jumped into Oklahoma is now 40% contained there, Oklahoma Forestry Services spokesperson Keith Merckx told CNN on Thursday evening.In addition to the mammoth Smokehouse Creek Fire, the Windy Deuce Fire in Texas has torched 142,000 acres and was 50% contained as of early Thursday afternoon.More than 85% of cattle in Texas are raised in the Panhandle, according to agricultural officials. In Hemphill County alone, 400,000 acres are burned, scores of homes have been destroyed and thousands of cattle have died, Hemphill County AgriLife Extension agent Andy Holloway said.OversightĭOT is responsible for fostering and promoting uniform time observance.A telephone pole burns from the Smokehouse Creek Fire on Wednesday in Canadian, Texas. The time zones established by the Standard Time Act, as amended by the Uniform Time Act, are Atlantic, eastern, central, mountain, Pacific, Alaska, Hawaii–Aleutian, Samoa, and Chamorro. §§ 260-64) establishes a system of uniform Daylight Saving Time throughout the Nation and its possessions, and provides that either Congress or the Secretary of Transportation can change a time-zone boundary. Today, the Uniform Time Act of 1966 (15 U.S.C. This responsibility was transferred from the Interstate Commerce Commission to DOT when Congress created DOT in 1966. Local decisions on which time zone to adopt were usually influenced by the time used by the railroads.įederal oversight of time zones began in 1918 with the enactment of the Standard Time Act, which vested the Interstate Commerce Commission with the responsibility for establishing boundaries between the standard time zones in the continental United States. States and municipalities then adopted one of the four zones, which were the eastern, central, mountain, and Pacific Time zones. and Canadian railroads adopted a four-zone system to govern their operations and reduce the confusion resulting from some 100 conflicting locally established “sun times” observed in terminals across the country. States do not have the authority to choose to be on permanent Daylight Saving Time. Under the Uniform Time Act, States may choose to exempt themselves from observing Daylight Saving Time by State law.
If a State chooses to observe Daylight Saving Time, it must begin and end on federally mandated dates. Nor does DOT have any role to play in a State's determination whether to observe Daylight Saving Time. DOT regulations at 49 CFR part 71 contain the official listing of the Nation's time zones.ĭOT also oversees the Nation's uniform observance of Daylight Saving Time however, DOT does not have the power to repeal or change Daylight Saving Time. The oversight of time zones was assigned to DOT because time standards are important for many modes of transportation. Department of Transportation (DOT) oversees the Nation's time zones.