Chippy Creek Fire resumes eastward trek

By JIM MANN

The Daily Inter Lake

A heavy smoke inversion continued to stifle burning activity on wildfires in Northwest Montana until Thursday afternoon.

When the inversion lifted at about 2:30 p.m., the Chippy Creek Fire resumed its eastward progression to the Flathead Indian Reservation. The fire was most recently sized at about 7,000 acres, up substantially from Wednesday's 3,000-acre estimate due to improved mapping and obvious perimeter expansion.

"The fire is getting very active this afternoon," said Paula Rosenthal, a fire information with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation.

Early in the afternoon, there was a large spot fire about 1/2 mile in front of the main fire's leading easterly front, but by late afternoon they had merged.

"I think it's generally safe to say that the fire will be on the Flathead Reservation by this evening," Rosenthal said.

There is a continuous "sea of timber" in front of the fire, Rosenthal said.

"This is not a fire we're going to be able to put out quickly just because of those conditions," she added. "It's going to take a combination of a break in the weather and finding those places where we can establish fire breaks" using clearings, rocky areas, roads or other features on the landscape.

There are about 120 people working on the fire, mainly concentrating on building containment lines at the heel of the blaze, which is closest to about a dozen structures in the Thompson River Valley. The fire is located about 24 miles north of Thompson Falls.

The smoke inversion limited growth on the Brush Creek Fire to about 300 acres Wednesday. Burning activity picked up Thursday, but the latest size-up on the fire was 4,600 acres by late afternoon.

The leading, eastern front of the fire is about six miles from the Star Meadows area, where there are homes.

The Flathead County Office of Emergency Services, working with an incident command team from Florida that assumed fire management duties Thursday, has developed an evacuation plan for the Star Meadows area and the Good Creek drainage.

"There's a potential threat at probably 125-150 homes" from the Star Meadows area into the Good Creek drainage, said Mark Peck, director of Flathead County's Office of Emergency Services. "We've got folks up there that have been looking at that for a couple of days."

Peck said the plan has trigger points for 24-hour, 12-hour and 4-hour notices for evacuation.

"Obviously, the homes that are closer to the fire are looking at a higher threat," he said.

County fire officials have also been doing evaluations to determine how defensible homes and other structures are. There are plans to spray structures with a long-lasting retardant concentrate called Cold-Fire, and a combination of Flathead County city and rural departments are on standby to position engines and firefighters at structures as needed.

There were about 120 people working on the fire as of Thursday afternoon, but more firefighters and equipment are expected. The terrain is suitable for dozers and timber felling equipment to flank the perimeter with fireline.

A public meeting is will be held today at 7 p.m. at the Hope Ranch fire camp, where fire officials and Flathead County Sheriff personnel will discuss evacuation plans and the overall firefighting plan.

The Tally Lake Ranger District has implemented an area closure that includes the Sylvia Lake campground, Forest Trails No. 171 and 480, and forest roads 2907, 538B and a portion of 2908.

On the Skyland Fire near Marias Pass, there were continued efforts to burn out a fire break between the northern flank of the fire to prevent it from spreading north of U.S. 2 into Glacier National Park or toward East Glacier. Before the burnout operations, the fire was sized at 19,500 acres, covering a swath more than 14 miles long and more than two miles wide in some places.

A heavy helicopter fitted with a machine that spits out pingpong ball spheres loaded with a flammable gel was used for aerial ignition operations near Marias Pass. Those operations were supported by helicopter retardant drops, with the helicopter reloading at portable retardant tanks located at the pass.

Dale Warinner, fire information officer, said there will likely be more burn-out operations further east in the next couple days.

Firefighters continued to be successful in protecting homes near Dog Gun Lake near the fire's northeastern leading front.

Plum Creek Timber Co. has announced that it is suspending its Montana logging operations because of the fire danger.

"We suspended felling operations as of (Wednesday) … just because of the explosiveness of the current fire situation," said Tom Ray, general manager of northwest resources. Loggers will continue to skid, load and haul logs until all felled timber is clear.

"If you look at the last couple of starts, they've been unable to catch them, and we're seeing large-scale resource losses as a result of these fires," Ray said.

"If you look at the Chippy Creek Fire and how that took off, we also get concerned about the safety of our contractors and employees," he said.

Since the fire blew up on Tuesday, it has burned more than an estimated 2,000 acres of Plum Creek lands, and it destroyed two pieces of equipment belonging to a company contractor - a yarder and a dozer.

"They were just burned up when the fire ran over an existing logging operation," Ray said. "They got some equipment out, but not all of it."

The suspension will remain in effect as long as hot, dry weather and high fire danger continues, Ray said.

"We understand it's a hardship for our contractors, but it is also necessary to protect the safety of our contractors and resources," he said.

Ray said there is also concern about the ability of fire protection agencies to respond, because firefighting resources are spread thin on numerous large fires.

The Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation announced Thursday that it is beefing up its initial attack capabilities in Northwest Montana. A Montana Army National Guard UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter with support personnel is expected to arrive at the state's Northwest Land Office just north of Kalispell today, to assist with initial attack efforts in the weeks to come.

Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by e-mail at jmann@dailyinterlake.com