A mulch fire that broke out early Saturday morning in Lehigh Township continues to smolder even after nearly a half-million gallons of water have been applied.

Contacted Wednesday afternoon, Lehigh Township Volunteer Fire Company Second Assistant Chief Brian Krische said the fire in the 300 block of Cherryville Road was still burning.

“The fire is so deep-seated underground that no matter how much water we’re putting down, it’s still not enough to penetrate down to the base of the fire,” said Krische, who added the fire is 100 feet wide by 100 feet long, with slopes down around 100 feet with a depth that could reach down to about 30 feet deep. “On Sunday, we thought we had it, but the next night it opened up and reignited.”

Krische said that even with nearly a half-million gallons of water, the slope and depth of the fire have made things extremely difficult.

“We reached out to multiple agencies, and just cannot find a piece of machinery that’s long enough to get down there, and with the ground being so unstable (it’s all fill), even if we got a piece of machinery down there, there’s a risk of it sliding or injuring the operator in some shape or form because of the unstable ground.”

Krische said they were able to get an excavator to trench out the left and right end of the fire.

“Today (Wednesday), we’re putting a sprinkler system in place on all four sides of the fire to box it in and prevent any wind from taking any embers to spread it to outside of the fire zone to keep it saturated,” he said. “This fire could burn for weeks.”

Krische noted that they have firefighters on scene to monitor the situation day and night.

“We’re getting a lot of 911 calls daily,” he said. “The public is going to see active fire up on that hillside for a period of time.”

The fire company was dispatched to a mulch fire just before 7 a.m., which Krische said at that time was a maze of mulch, wood chips, tree logs and debris.

The area is on a 60-degree slope, which made it difficult to access.

There were 10 fire companies called for assistance.

Lehigh Township has enacted a burn ban because of dry conditions.