Dry air and an abundance of vegetation brought on by spring rains are fueling fires across parts of Texas.

The Hidden Pines fire in Bastrop has scorched over 4,000 acres, destroyed at least 48 homes and threatens dozens more. Firefighters and officials from across the state continue to battle the fire days after it first began.

We still have plenty of dry air that’s in place over the Central and the Northeastern half of the state. We’re hoping to get this dry air out of here and hopefully give some of our crews and some of the state ops (operations) a bit of a break as the weather pattern begins to change to a more favorable environment to get some rainfall back in, Juan Acuña, meteorologist with the Texas Forest Service, said in an interview with the TFB Radio Network.

As of Tuesday, the fire was about 70 percent contained.

Monday, the Texas A&M Forest Service responded to 16 new fires burning 1,971 acres. The fires were reported in Walker County, Stephens County, Bastrop County, Robertson County and Crockett County.

It’s not just in Central Texas. We continue to have active fire weather all across the state. It’s just about the time frame. We had dry air present all over the state basically all of last week. We’re just looking for that activity to slowly improve going into the middle and end of this week, Acuña said.

According to Acuña, this type of weather pattern is not conducive for strong thunderstorms carrying large hail or damaging winds. Instead, it looks more like the type of rain people across the state have been praying for.

This is more of a subtle rain, moderate shower and thunderstorm activity. It’s always a concern for us, but at this point, we’re not looking for anything widespread severe across the state,” Acuña said.

Texans are urged to use caution to prevent future fires. Approximately 90 percent of all wildfires are caused by people and their activities. Tips on preventing wildfires can be found here: http://tfsweb.tamu.edu/PreventWildfire.

Curt Lancaster’s full interview with Acuña can be heard on Texas News and Views here: http://bit.ly/1Gg5C1D.

Updates on current fires across Texas can be found on the Texas Forest Service page here: http://tfsweb.tamu.edu/currentsituation/.