Crews work to contain fire near Swan Lake

The wildfire burning approximately seven miles southeast of Swan Lake was upgraded from a type 4 to a type 3 fire Monday due to the increased complexity of the effort to contain the blaze.

According to Pat Cross, the public information officer for the South Fork Lost Creek fire, there are currently four hand crews, two engines, one water tender and five helicopters — a total of 150 personnel — that have been assigned to the fire, which had grown to 490 acres by Monday night. The fire is currently 5 percent contained.

Cross said fire crews’ efforts have been complicated by the area’s terrain.

“The base of the fire is fairly flat, so we can get the hand crews in there, but it very quickly gets steep and rocky,” Cross said. “The majority of the fire is being worked on by helicopter because it’s just too steep to get hand crews in there safely.”

The fire is believed to be caused by people and likely started near the South Lost Creek forest road.

If the fire continues moving in the same direction, it will eventually get into a wilderness area of the Spotted Bear Ranger District. For that reason, Cross said, it’s not worth risking the safety of the fire crews to fight the blaze on the ground.

Hand crews continued building containment lines Monday.

“We’re really focusing our efforts to keep it from moving down the hill or west,” Cross said. “If it goes north, it will get into a higher, rockier area, and it won’t burn too well up there.”

Although fire crews were aided by humidity and cooler temperatures Monday, Cross said the forecast calls for warmer, drier weather for the next few days.

“We’ll keep an eye on how that affects things,” he said. “It’s funny being out here on a fire this high with the snow we had up there this spring, but it is fire season.”

Fire crews are also working to contain another fire burning farther north on the west slope of the Swan Mountain Range near Peters Ridge. That fire, near Strawberry Lake, covers somewhere between 10 and 20 acres.

Cross said food and helicopter resources from the South Fork Lost Creek fire are being shared with crews working on the Peters Ridge fire.

Smoke from both the Peters Ridge and South Fork Lost Creek fires is visible from the Flathead Valley.