State, federal agencies dispatch aircraft, crews, focus efforts on two new fires near Salcha, White Mountains
State and federal firefighters hustled Tuesday to respond to a second day of lightning strikes that have ignited more than 50 wildfires around the state since Monday afternoon. And the agencies released new estimates on the number of strikes around the state over the past two days.
The federal Alaska Fire Service and state Division of Forestry and Fire Protection now say more than 18,000 strikes were recorded during Monday’s thunderstorms. They say those and nearly 5,000 strikes on Tuesday have sparked at least 51 wildfires around the state, including the Champion Fire in the White Mountains Recreation Area.
“This is kind of a priority for us, because on the 1st, which is Tuesday, there is a federal subsistence Fortymile caribou hunt opening,” says Beth Ipsen, an Alaska Fire Service spokesperson.
Ipsen says the fire burning near milepost 50 of the Steese Highway near Nome Creek was reported Tuesday.
“So we are mobilizing the Midnight Sun Hotshots to go out there, because we don’t want that fire impacting the hunt,” she said.
Forestry Division spokesperson Lily Coyle says the other priority wildfire reported Tuesday is the 75-acre Deep Creek Fire near Salcha, that was spotted by a pilot working the McCoy Creek Fire, 10 miles away.
“We were able to get some of the BLM smokejumpers in on the ground,” she said, “and the aerial resources were just making repeated water and retardant drops.”
Coyle said Tuesday that Forestry dispatched aircraft and crews to keep the fire from spreading to nearby cabins. And she says the 25-acre McCoy Creek Fire hasn’t grown since Monday.
“We still have firefighters working on that fire and working on structure protection,” she said. “But a lot of the aviation resources did go and respond to the close-by Deep Creek Fire.”
Also Tuesday, Forestry sent a Tanana Chiefs initial-attack crew to the 6-Mile Pogo Fire that’s burned 6 acres in an area near the Pogo mine access road north of Delta Junction. Coyle says it’s considered a priority fire.
“That is in a full-management zone,” she said, “so that is currently staffed and there’s helicopters working on that.”
Coyle says Forestry is monitoring another nearby wildfire -- the Pogo Mine Road Fire that’s burning farther up the road toward the mine.
Ipsen, the Alaska Fire Service spokesperson, says smokejumpers have made progress on the 11-point-5-acre Moose Fire, near milepost 100 of the Elliott Highway.
“The smokejumpers got a good handle on it last night, got a line around it and now they’re mopping up,” she said.
Meanwhile, the state Department of Environmental Conservation issued a second air-quality advisory Tuesday that says smoke from the wildfires in Alaska and Canada likely will continue to blanket areas of the state over the next few days. The advisory also says the smoke could be unhealthy for people who have respiratory and other health problems.
Correction: This story has been revised to clarify that 51 fires were recorded Tuesday statewide, not just in the Interior, and to clarify that the Tanana Chiefs firefighters dispatched to the Deep Creek Fire are members of a Type II initial-attack crew.
