As fire eases, Logan Pass should see west side access Wednesday

Logan Pass in Glacier National Park is expected to open from the west side on Wednesday, superintendent Jeff Mow said Sunday evening. The pass has been closed since July 22 due to the Reynolds Creek Fire. The east side of the Sun Road will remain closed.

The St. Mary Visitor Center will open tomorrow and the St. Mary campground will also open Wednesday, Mow said.

Rain is expected over the 3,100 acre blaze Monday into Tuesday. The fire perimeter flanks both sides of the Sun Road for several miles on the Park’s east side.

Crews have been making good progress on the fire. They’ve dumped more than 1 million gallons of water of the blaze, deputy incident commander Steve Frye said during an informational meeting in West Glacier.

He said the two main concerns are keeping the fire from traveling eastward onto the Blackfeet Indian Reservation and from moving west, where it tumbles down the slopes near Reynolds Creek and then burns back up the drainage.

Today crews put a 4,000-foot line in an avalanche chute of the fire’s west flank using explosives, which they hope will stop the western movement of the fire.

On the east side, they’ve dug hand lines in the trees above the west end of Two Dog Flats, near Two Dog Creek.

Frye said while the fire has been hot in some places, it’s not a stand replacement fire.

Firefighter and visitor safety has always been the No. 1 priority on the blaze, both Mow and Frye said.

Mow dispelled any notion that the Park Service was ever going to let the fire burn.

“This was a full suppression fire from the very start,” he said.

Both men said they understood the economic and social impacts the fire to surrounding communities.

Frye said the fire camp has been using local Blackfeet vendors for services whenever it can and has hired Blackfeet firefighters and fire companies. About 650 people total are working on the fire.

“We have some of the best firefighters available in the U.S.,” fighting the fire, Frye said.

Evacuation notices have been lifted on the west side of Lower St. Mary Lake. While visitor safety was one reason for closing Logan Pass from the west side when the fire first got going, another problem is sewage.

Pumper trucks that empty the pit toilets at Logan Pass go down the east side, because the road doesn’t have the large, twisting turns like the west side. They should be able to go down the east side by Wednesday. Mow said that if things go well, they would likely open the east side of the Sun Road to vehicle traffic incrementally, though there is no timeframe at this point.

Some trails probably won’t reopen this year. The fire burned over the Siyeh Pass Trail at Baring Creek, the Otokomi Lake Trail and the St. Mary Falls trail.

One structure was lost in the blaze — the Baring Creek Cabin and one car, a private rental car, burned in the blaze. The Sun Road was not damaged by the fire, Frye said. No one has been injured in the fire.