SHELBURNE FALLS — Firefighters from six departments worked to extinguish a fire at 18 South St. on Tuesday evening after it burned a resident’s shed to rubble and spread to the railroad tracks behind his home.

Homeowner Dana McNay said he had put his lawn tractor in the shed behind his home and went to his backyard to rake leaves when it caught fire.

“I was raking leaves down below and then, poof, the whole thing caught on fire,” McNay said. “It was probably a half hour, I put the thing in there. There were no leaves underneath it because I had cleaned it out. My intent was to take the battery out of it tomorrow and put it in the cellar to keep the battery charged.”

Firefighters from Buckland, Heath, Shelburne Falls, Charlemont, Conway and Colrain worked for than an hour to extinguish a fire that Buckland Fire Chief Herb Guyette said was not unique this season, given the abnormally warm and dry climate. The fire was called in shortly before 5 p.m.

Guyette said although the fire spread past the shed and into the brush behind McNay’s home, the railroad tracks seemed to stop it for the most part. He said no one was injured in the blaze.

“A few of the railroad ties are smoldering right now, but the tracks did stop it,” Guyette said. “It was a good time of day to have this response, as everyone was getting home from work. We probably would have had a lot bigger of a brush fire otherwise. … It seems like every day there’s been either some type of fire that leads to a brush fire or a brush fire that starts a structure fire. It’s been a busy couple weeks for everyone here.”

McNay credited his neighbor, Donald Wheeler, who saw the fire and sprayed it with a garden hose until firefighters arrived, with “saving him.”

“I was standing here looking at this new construction that was going on, and a woman stopped and said, ‘This barn’s on fire.’ I looked over, and I could see, just see it smoking and going up in flames,” Wheeler recounted. “I raced over and they were calling 911. ... I just grabbed the garden hose and wet everything down for as long as I could.”

Anthony Cammalleri can be reached at acammalleri@recorder.com or 413-930-4429.