|
Wildfires burn more than 50,000 acres in
Washington The Associated Press 8/16/01 12:23 AM State and federal land managers closed campgrounds, hiking trails and roads Wednesday in Eastern Washington, where lightning-sparked wildfires had burned more than 50,000 acres and "terrible weather conditions" were right for the fires to quickly grow. Scattered evacuations were also ordered along a small portion of popular Lake Chelan, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Ken Frederick said. High temperatures have topped 100 degrees in some areas, with low relative humidity in an unstable air mass. "Those combinations are blowup conditions," Frederick said. Washington Gov. Gary Locke declared a state of emergency in Chelan, Okanogan, Spokane and Yakima counties. The declaration allows the state to use people, equipment and other resources from around the state when wildfires exceed the firefighting capacity of local areas. The biggest blaze in the state was the 40,000-acre Virginia Lake complex, a grass-and-sagebrush fire south of Okanogan in northcentral Washington that threatened about 50 homes, said Nick Mickel, a spokesman for the multi-agency fire management team. The fire burned at least six, and possibly as many as 12 houses, on Monday. No buildings have been lost since then. No injuries were reported. Acreage on the Virginia Lake complex was revised upward from 27,000 acres earlier in the day. Some of that increase was fire growth, some was new mapping, Mickel said. Overall, firefighters made good progress Wednesday, he said, although there was still no estimate on containment. Local roads at the northern and southern ends of the fire were closed Wednesday morning because of smoke and firefighting work. Alternate U.S. 97 was the recommended detour. The Okanogan County Commissioners declared their county a disaster area and sought the state's help, Mickel said. Nearly 300 firefighters have been called in to fight the blaze. Eight miles northwest of the Virginia Lake fire, the St. Mary's fire, which started Tuesday, had grown to 4,000 acres by late Wednesday. Numerous homes were threatened. No evacuations had been ordered although some people left their homes voluntarily, Mickel said. "We've been dumping retardant on that most of the day, trying to slow the progress," he said. Farther west, the Rex Creek complex of fires had grown to about 2,700 acres, and prompted an evacuation order for all of the summer cabins between Prince and Flick creeks, a distance of 12 to 15 miles. There are believed to be up to about 10 cabins in the area, and Forest Service employees and Chelan County sheriff's deputies were going door-to-door to talk to people or leave information if the cabins were unoccupied, Frederick said. "We expect continued problems with the Rex Creek complex because of the weather," he said. "We can't get people out in front to do anything about the fires." Most of the firefighting efforts Wednesday were focused on protecting buildings in the remote area about 40 miles up Lake Chelan. Additionally, the Wenatchee and Okanogan national forests decided to close the lower half of the Lake Chelan-Sawtooth Wilderness, south of War Creek. Backcountry rangers were working the trails, notifying people they needed to leave, Frederick said. South of Lake Chelan, the Forest Service closed the Icicle Creek watershed near Leavenworth to recreational use, primarily camping, hiking and rock climbing. "We want to have as few people in there as possible should there be problems," Frederick said. The 23-fire Icicle complex had burned about 1,350 acres west of the Bavarian-theme village of Leavenworth on the east slopes of the Cascade Range. Eighteen homes on Icicle Road were evacuated and the road was closed. South of the Virginia Lake complex, the Brewster complex had burned more than 4,300 acres as its largest fire, Gamble's Mill, grew to 3,700 acres. More than 20 homes on the southeast side of the Gamble's Mill fire were evacuated Wednesday afternoon, said Andrew Stenbeck, a spokesman for the state Department of Natural Resources. More than 700 firefighters were fighting Gamble's Mill. Several other fires in that complex were contained, he said. West of Yakima, the 750-acre Spruce-Dome fire complex had been reported 90 percent encircled by fire trail earlier Wednesday. But Forest Service spokeswoman Marti Ames said crews were pulled off the fire in the late afternoon because conditions had grown so dangerous. Elsewhere in north central Washington, the Tonasket complex, made up of 15 to 17 fires, including the 120-acre Bailey Mountain fire, was burning on the eastern side of the Okanogan National Forest. On Wednesday afternoon, crews were temporarily pulled back from the Bailey Mountain fire, which was burning too intensely to fight safely, said Forest Service spokeswoman Kristy Longanecker. No homes were immediately threatened. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. [Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml] |