Montana Wildfire Roundup

Too Hot, Too Dry: Montana Wildfires Riled

By Matthew Frank, 7-29-07

As predicted, Saturday’s extremely hot and dry conditions stirred up Montana’s big wildfires, and a few new blazes popped up around the region.

The Meriwether Fire in the Gates of the Mountain Wilderness blackened another 1,400 acres Saturday for a total of about 7,500 acres, fire information officer Katie Jones said.

A huge column of smoke hung above the fire area Saturday, and it’s expected to persist Sunday due to extreme fire behavior. The fire is spreading to the north and northeast.

“The objective today,” Jones said, “is to keep the fire corralled into the wilderness area.”

A few more campgrounds have been closed: Holter Lake, Departure Point, and Big Log. The American Bar subdivision along the Missouri River remains closed.

The Ahorn Fire, Montana’s largest blaze of the season so far, burning the Bob Marshall Wilderness and Lewis and Clark National Forest 30 miles west of Augusta, grew 1,670 acres Saturday for a total of 16,870 acres. It was 13 percent contained Sunday morning.

Click here to view a map of the fire, color-coded with its day-by-day progression.

On its west side, the fire crossed Ahorn Creek, the fire camp reported, advancing farther west into the Bob Marshall Wilderness. Water drops were effective suppressing the fire in the Pretty Prairie area in the fire’s northeast section. On Sunday crews will continue work on that northeast side, putting in hose line and constructing fire line.

In recent days crews have continued to construct indirect fire line on the fire’s south side in the Ford Creek drainage working north to Gibson Reservoir. There are a number of structures to the south, including summer lease cabins in the Benchmark area. The area from the Benchmark Trailhead to the Woodlake Campground was evacuated last weekend.

Meanwhile, the Skyland Fire near Glacier National Park jumped containment lines and more than doubled in size to 1,000 acres, forcing the evacuation of a lodge and closing a stretch of U.S. 2. Click here for the AP story.

The Mile Marker 124 Fire ignited Saturday a few miles east of Clinton near Rock Creek. It was estimated to be 300 acres in size Sunday morning, burning grass, mixed conifer forest, and open pine stands. The fire is believed to be human-caused, and an investigation is pending.

Twenty miles or so along I-90 to the west, near Bonner, another blaze sparked that temporarily closed the Interstate. The Missoulian reports that the fire was about five acres in size.

There are at least 17 large fires (more than 90 acres) burning in Montana and numerous small fires popping up across the state. Here is a region-by-region breakdown of the fire activity in Montana.

Also, check in often to InciWeb, where the large fires are being updated from fire camp regularly. The large fires with InciWeb pages are linked in the roundup below. Click on the name of the fire for that fire’s page.

For a look at fire weather forecasts, click here and for a national breakdown of wildland fires, click here.

Stage II fire restrictions, meaning no campfires, smoking, daytime industrial operations and motor vehicle use off designated roads and trails, are in effect Monday across western and west-central Montana. Click here for more details.

Western Montana:

Bitterroot National Forest Dispatchers reported one new start and one possible start between Friday and Saturday afternoons. One is adjacent to the Saddle Gulch fire and the second is a report of a smoke in the White Cap drainage, both on the West Fork Ranger District, the Forest reported. The Lazy Creek Fire has been controlled.

Friday Bitterroot National Forest fire crews were preparing for the possibility of new starts that may result from the weather predicted for the weekend –- temperatures expected to reach the triple digits and dry thunderstorms across the southern portion of the Forest, a release stated.

The Bitterroot’s biggest fires are both wildland fire use fires—the Harrington Mountain Fire at 110 acres and the Harrington Ridge Fire at 200-plus southwest of Darby. 

Including the Harrington Fires, there remain 11 fires in the Frank Church – River of No Return, Anaconda-Pintlar and Selway Bitterroot Wilderness Areas which are being managed as WFU fires and carefully monitored by air patrol.

For more on the Bitterroot blazes go to http://63.196.254.151/WildWeb/WCMT-BRC.htm and click “recent incidents.”

Noteworthy Fires in Western Montana:

• The Conger Creek Fire, Lolo National Forest, 20 miles north of Ovando along Highway 200. 385 acres, being managed and monitored, not actively suppressed.
• The Sawmill Creek Fire, Lolo National Forest in Welcome Creek Wilderness along Rock Creek, 22 miles southwest of Missoula. 150 acres. Up to 100 homes in the Rock Creek Area could become threatened if the fire picks up, says fire information officer Nick Spang said Friday.
• The St. Regis Complex, in Western Montana’s Lolo National Forest. A total of 94 acres. Nealry contained at last report.
• The Bridge Fire in the Clearwater National Forest in Idaho, 45 miles southeast of Missoula, had burned 700 acres and was zero percent contained Saturday. Structures and campgrounds were threatened.

Northwestern Montana:

• The Garceau Fire, 10 miles from Polson, had burned a total of 3,450 acres by Sunday morning, 50 percent contained.
• The Skyland Fire in the Flathead National Forest totals 1,000 acres, two percent contained. The fire jumped containment lines Saturday and forced the evacuation of a lodge and closed U.S. Highway 2.

Southwestern Montana:

The Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest has a temporary closure in effect, including the area north of Lacy and McVey creeks and west of the Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway all the way to the forest boundary east and south of Highway 43.

Noteworthy Fires in Southwestern Montana:

• The Pattengail Creek Fire, Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest 10 miles northeast of Wisdom. 4,256 acres. Sunday morning it was still 25 percent contained.
• The Owl Fire, burning along the Wyoming-Montana border in Yellowstone National Park, was 2,810 acres, 10 percent contained. All visitor services, park entrances and roads are open. Some trails and backcountry campsites are temporarily closed.

Central Montana:

The Meriwether Fire in the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness, 37 miles north of Helena, had grown to 7,500 acres by Sunday morning.

An emergency closure is in place that encompasses the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness Area as well as Coulter Campground along the Missouri River. The closure does not include the Meriwether day use area at this time or the river-way. The campgrounds along Holter Reservoir (BLM) remain open.

Noteworthy Fires in Central Montana:

• Ahorn Fire, Lewis and Clark National Forest, 35 miles West of Augusta, near Benchmark. 16,870 acres. 13 percent contained.
• Fool Creek Wildland Fire Use Fire, Lewis and Clark National Forest, in Bob Marshall Wilderness. 6,264 acres. This fire is being managed by a Wildland Fire Use team, meaning it is being managed for resource benefit, not actively suppressed. (Click here for more information on Wildand Fire Use teams.)
• Middle Fork Fire, Lewis and Clark National Forest, Middle Fork Judith Wilderness Study Area, 20 miles southwest of Utica. 1,146 acres. This fire is also being managed as a Wildand Fire Use fire and is burning in a remote area. It was started on June 21 by a lightning strike.

Southeastern Montana:

• The Walk In Fire was fully contained Friday at 370 acres.
• The Rump Fire was fully contained Friday at 640 acres.

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