ANCHORAGE (AP) -- Anchorage School District officials said a second fire this week is prompting a re-evaluation of a rubber ground cover installed at some district playgrounds.
A suspicious fire burned a section of the playground at Susitna Elementary School on Tuesday, a day after a fire destroyed an estimated $200,000 worth of playground equipment at Alpenglow Elementary School in Eagle River.
A 12-year-old boy has been charged with setting the first fire.
Arson also is suspected in Tuesday's blaze, which swept across a 10- by 25-foot section of shredded rubber mulch in minutes. The fire also charred landscape timbers and singed a swing set.
Since 2000, the Anchorage School District has installed rubber mulch at seven schools. Rubber mulch, usually made from recycled tires, is becoming a popular ground covering at playgrounds around the country.
``Absolutely it's a good material,'' said Donna Thompson, director of the National Program for Playground Safety, an organization affiliated with the University of Northern Iowa that promotes safe equipment.
Rubber mulch cushions children from falls better than pea gravel, Anchorage school officials said. It stays in place better. It's firm enough for kids in wheelchairs or with other disabilities to get around on it, meeting the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission considers rubber mulch and mats an acceptable playground surface for preventing head injury. A spokesman there, Ken Giles, said he hadn't heard of a particular fire problem.
But a study of 13 landscape mulches found that ground rubber was especially easy to ignite with a propane torch, though not with a discarded cigarette, according to an article in the November issue of the Journal of Arboriculture.
