The week in fires: Rains offer a respite, but more wind expected

Rains gave area wildfires a respite, but fire activity could pick up again by Thursday, as another wind event is expected.

The Howe Ridge Fire in Glacier National Park saw about a .25 inch to .5 inch of rain from a front that moved through Sunday into Monday. The front also brought much cooler temperatures and smoke-free skies. Much of Glacier remains open and evacuation warnings in the North Fork and Apgar have been lifted.

But in the far north end of the park, a new fire, the Boundary Fire, also wreaked havoc, closing Waterton Lakes National Park for several days as it burned about a mile west of Waterton Lake in the U.S.

The 2,125 acre fire saw nearly an inch of rain on Sunday into Monday and Waterton has since reopened. However, all trails leading into and out of Goat Haunt remained closed as of presstime.

How Ridge, meanwhile, was set to simmer. The southwest end of the blaze wasn’t showing much, if any, smoke by Monday evening, but the north and east ends of the blaze were still smoking, particularly near Mount Vaught, where the fire made a sizable run on Aug. 24, shooting up the flanks of the peak.

On the east end, the fire is about a half mile from the Going-to-the-Sun Road at its closest point. On the west end, it’s about 100 feet from the Inside North Fork Road. The Sun Road was still closed from the foot of Lake McDonald to Logan Pass as of presstime.

All told, 27 structures were lost in the Howe Ridge Fire, including 13 residences and 14 outbuildings. An aluminum skiff with an outboard motor that was inside the boat house at the Lake McDonald Lodge was also lost when the boathouse burned.

The fire has cost $5.6 million to fight to date, public information officer Sarah Moody said.

It is currently listed at 12,460 acres.

John Pierson’s Type I team will transition out this week and will be replaced by the Northern Rockies Type I team.

The fire currently has five helicopters available.

Park superintendent Jeff Mow gave further insight into the fire’s evolution on the night of Aug. 11 when the fire was started by lightning. Mow told the Hungry Horse News that the fire was first called in about 7:20 p.m. He said a helicopter was requested, but he was told none was available.

That same day, the Bear Springs Fire, according to a press release by the Montana Department of Conservation and Resources, was burning near Marion. Two CL-215 “Super Scooper” aircraft and a Type 2 helicopter from the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation worked for several hours to slow fire growth.

The next day, about 11:15 a.m., the same CL-215 “Super Scooper” aircraft were deployed on the Howe Ridge Fire. They dropped water on the blaze about every four minutes and they each hold at least 1,000 gallons of water.

Over the course of an hour, that would amount to 30,000 gallons of water per hour and they were on the fire until at least 2:15 p.m. They had little impact on the blaze.

West Glacier had seen record heat just prior to the fire, reaching 101 degrees on Aug. 10 and most of July was hot and dry, with little rain.

In addition, a firefighting crew did try to get to the fire Aug. 11 by foot, but couldn’t make it through the thick downed timber and lodgepole pine the fire was burning in.

They attempted to attack the fire the next day as well, but the flame lengths by then were 10 feet and the trees and down timber from the previous Robert Fire of 2003 made it too dangerous, Chief Ranger Paul Austin has said previously.

Private landowners, in a meeting with Mow and Austin shortly after the fire, were critical of the Park’s initial response, though they were appreciative of the efforts of firefighters in their attempts to save homes. One person suggested at that meeting that the park get its own helicopter. Mow agreed.

Parks Canada does have its own helicopters.

Losses aside, the fire will have beneficial impacts to the long-term ecology of the region, fire managers told a small crowd in West Glacier last week.

The fire is burning in thick lodgepole and downed timber left behind from the Robert Fire. Operations coordinator Rocky Gilbert described it as burning through a pile of firewood.

“It’s doing a lot of good,” he said. “It will make it easier for people and animals to get around in the future.”

This is the first fire to re-burn in Glacier in such a short time span. Re-burns in wilderness areas like the Bob Marshall are not uncommon.

On the east end of the fire, crews used aerial ignition to make the fire line straight, which is easier to fight than if it had fingers, Gilbert said. He said the goal is to keep the fire from crossing the Going-to-the-Sun Road and to preserve the Trail of the Cedars and the Park’s ancient cedar groves around it.

Having said that, if the fire does progress into the cedar-hemlock forests to the north, firefighters will be pulled out to the McDonald Creek Trail — the dense canopy of the forest is just too dangerous, he noted. A sprinkler system is set up on the trail.

Crews have put up hose lays near Fish Creek and have also wrapped two historic cabins in the North Fork near Camas Creek and Howe Lake.

They tried to set a burnout to clean up the line near the Inside Road, but Gilbert said it didn’t want to burn.

Other fires burning in the region have also seen minimal growth in past few days, they include:

- Paola Ridge Fire burning west of Essex is now about 712 acres. It’s hemmed in by the railroad and shaded fuel breaks near U.S. Highway 2. It too, saw some rain, but not enough to put it out. It’s 7 percent contained.

- The Whale Butte Fire up the North Fork is listed at 439 acres and is 39 percent contained. It’s been holding on fire lines created near old logging roads and also saw some rain.