By Gavin Johnson, WCJB TV20 News

You may have noticed thick smoke and ashes falling from the sky in North Central Florida. It's the first large-scale brush fire of the year and authorities are a bit concerned about how early it's come.The Sandy Road Fire continues to burn in Lafayette County.

It's burning near the same area where a large fire tore through in 2001-- burning 64-thousand acres near Lafayette. The area has since been under reconstruction.

Friday firefighters were doing what they thought was a controlled burn. Instead things got quickly out of control.