Jamestown park seeks reopening by Memorial Day after fire damage

A tipped-over grill damaged Shelter 1 and part of the playground at Jamestown Park, forcing Jamestown leaders to close the East Fork Road site and push for a reopening by Memorial Day weekend.

The fire broke out Tuesday, May 19, after a lit grill fell over, according to the report from WFMY News 2. A bystander called 911 and tried to put out the flames before firefighters arrived. The man believed to have caused the fire allegedly ran from the scene, giving the incident a law-enforcement angle beyond a routine park accident.

The immediate effect was a shutdown of some of the park’s most used spaces. Officials closed the shelter and playground area while they assessed damage and cleanup needs, a disruption that landed just as families and neighborhood groups were looking toward the holiday weekend. Jamestown leaders said they hoped to have the park back open by Memorial Day, but the timetable depended on how quickly repairs and safety checks could be completed.

Jamestown Park sits at 7041 E Fork Rd., Jamestown, NC 27282, and town materials describe it as one of the community’s major recreation sites. The park includes four soccer fields, two baseball fields, shelters, cornhole boards, a sand volleyball court and open green space. Other town listings add a fully accessible playground, a natural play area and trail, tables, bathrooms, Bicentennial Greenway access and an 18-hole golf course, showing how much public use concentrates around the damaged area.

The town’s facility listing for Shelter 1 notes restrictions on the site, including that gas fryers are not permitted. That detail gives added weight to the grill fire, which damaged both Shelter 1 and one of the shades in the nearby playground area, according to WFMY News 2 and WXII Channel 12.

The fire also came amid a volatile stretch for outdoor burning in Guilford County. The North Carolina Forest Service lifted a statewide open-burning ban for Guilford and 18 other counties effective May 8 after it had been in place since March 28 because of hazardous forest-fire conditions. Then, on May 20, Guilford County issued an emergency burn ban because of unhealthy ozone-related air quality.

For Jamestown, the fire was more than a patch of burned property. It temporarily cut off a public gathering place on the edge of a holiday weekend and left town officials trying to restore a heavily used park before Memorial Day.