Mount Sentinel Fire Snuffed Out

By Matthew Frank, 7-11-08

	Caption: Photo by Chris Lombardi.

The throngs of gawkers are gone, but crews remain on Missoula’s blackened Mount Sentinel, mopping up a 390-acre blaze that eclipsed the city’s 4th of July fireworks.

The fire is now 100 percent contained, said Cindy Super, the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation’s fire prevention coordinator. “It didn’t do much overnight, even with really strong winds on it”—30 to 40 mph.

She said firefighters will be monitoring the fire all weekend and possibly into next week. The mountain’s trails will remain closed.

The initial bill is about $150,000, Super said, but “obviously we can expect that to go up a little bit.” Maybe as high as $200,000. It will be divvied among the various agencies involved, and youth court will decide if and how the two young boys that ignited the blaze—apparently with a stolen lighter and phone book pages—will be held accountable.

It was the first headline blaze in this young summer in western Montana. “We were able to put all of our systems through a test, a real life test,” Super said. “Everything went well.”

It was also Cindy Super’s first fire as the DNRC’s fire prevention coordinator, taking the reigns from Jamie Kirby as this summer’s public face on state fire management. “I think this was a great experience, from my perspective,” Super said. She added: “Being put in the media spotlight, I didn’t say anything stupid ... I don’t think.”

And as fire prevention coordinator, Super said the fire on Mount Sentinel is about as strong a wake-up call as a community can get: no matter how cool and wet spring might be, fires can and will pop up.

A scorched Mount Sentinel, on display from almost all corners of the Missoula Valley, is going to be “an extremely potent reminder.”

Here’s a slideshow of photos taken Wednesday night for NewWest.Net by Anne Medley and Chris Lombardi: