Kootenai National Forest continues to burn

With the arrival of cooler temperatures and some additional moisture, the fire season seems to be winding down. Forest officials, however, are saying that is not the case. 

The Klatawa fire, which forced evacuations near Libby in August, continues to burn inside its perimeter. Kootenai National Forest crews are still working to ensure containment of the blaze.

“A fuel break was put in yesterday and more fire line is being constructed today,” Kootenai National Forest public affairs officer Willie Sykes wrote in a Wednesday press release. “Further south in the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness, a hot shot crew spent two days constructing fire line on the north end of the Berray fire to keep it from growing in that direction.”

The Berray fire is southwest of Libby, on the east side of U.S. Highway 56 and north of U.S. Highway 200 in Sanders County.

The area’s most recent fire, the Smearl fire, is located in the area of Leigh Lake, southeast of Libby. As of Wednesday, the fire is reportedly covering approximately 160 acres of ground and growing. Additional resources are being deployed from the area to combat the blaze, which is anticipated to grow during the weekend as conditions worsen.

“An 18-person crew from the Helena National Forest is on its way to the Kootenai National Forest today and a Type III team comprised of district resources will take over management of the fire tomorrow,” Sykes said. “Four helicopters are providing air support and air tankers are being used to drop fire retardant as well.”

Forest supervisor Chris Savage met with Lincoln County commissioners Wednesday morning and told them the Smearl fire was human-caused, apparently the result of an unattended campfire.

The smoldering and resulting smoke are expected to continue for the foreseeable future, Savage said. Due to the heavy presence of smoke in the air, the Montana Department of Environmental Quality declared Libby’s air “unhealthy” in its Thursday report.

“It looks as if fire activity is once again impacting Libby and Thompson Falls today,” the report read. “Satellite analysis from yesterday identifies some hot spots near where they have been, but clouds prevented the satellite from detecting smoke locations. The disturbance from yesterday brought a little cooler temperatures and minimal precipitation, but it looks to have helped the situation in northwest Montana. A high pressure ridge is developing today, and drier and warmer conditions are expected for the next couple of days, so conditions may not improve greatly unless fire activity significantly changes.”

In his report to the commissioners, Savage said more than 400,000 man-hours have been worked fighting fires in the Kootenai. During those 400,000 hours of work, Savage said there was not a single significant accident or injury. 

Savage also told the commissioners the fires in the Kootenai have had significant impact on forest operations, timber sales and, by extension, the local economy.

“We lost more than $600,000 due to fire transfer,” Savage said. “That’s money that was for road rehabilitation, fisheries and treatment projects.”

Savage said those dollars would have been primarily allocated to local contractors to perform those projects.

“It’s $600,000 in contracting lost to the local economy,” he said.

The Forest Service is looking at possible salvage opportunities, but Savage said the pickings were slim.

“We’re looking down near Berray Mountain for possible salvage, but most of this is in roadless, wilderness areas,” he said. “There could possibly be some small sales from timber cut while establishing the fire breaks.”

September did not bring much in the way of moisture to the area, and the forecast for the next three months is essentially more of the same, leading forest officials to predict a long season of smoke and fire.

“The month of September saw a mere .25 inch of precipitation in the Libby Valley with 10 degrees above normal average high temperatures,” Sykes wrote. “The fires at this time are primarily burning in rough, inaccessible terrain away from private property and homes.”

Savage said the fires would continue to burn until the weather patterns change.

“Until we get pretty significant rain or snow, they’re going to keep skunking around,” he said.