Yukon Training Area

The federal Bureau of Land Management is asking for public comment on the Army’s request to keep using 870,000 acres of public land around Fort Wainwright and Fort Greely for military training areas. The BLM has scheduled two public meetings next month to talk about the Army land withdrawals.

The Alaska-based 11th Airborne Division will host its first large-scale training exercise next week on ranges around Fort Wainwright and Eielson Air Force Base. That means more than 500 Army vehicles that’ll take part in the exercise will be traveling on the Parks Highway and the northernmost stretch of the Richardson Highway over the next couple of weeks.

The federal Alaska Fire Service and U.S. Army Alaska set fires in a big military training range near Fort Greely over the weekend. And they’ll probably ignite a few more blazes in training areas around Fairbanks over the next couple of weeks to reduce the amount of grass and other vegetation that could fuel bigger and more destructive wildfires.

Army officials are investigating the death of a soldier over the weekend during a field training exercise near Fort Wainwright.A U.S. Army Alaska news…