‘Still very extreme’: Officials see little reprieve as wildfires burn across NE Minnesota
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Despite some recent rain and a shift in the wind, state and federal officials battling wildfires burning across northeastern Minnesota made clear Friday that fire conditions remain volatile, some of the biggest fires are growing and new fires are likely to ignite.
“We are still very extreme here. Our fuels are extremely dry,” Jason Loomis, incident commander for the National Incident Management Organization, told reporters during an early afternoon briefing. “It’s going to take some significant moisture over time to get a little bit of a reprieve.”
Authorities are focusing now on the area of Big Lake, where the Bear Trap Fire is only about a mile away from resorts, homes and cabins, said Loomis, who’s overseeing efforts to stop the region’s five largest fires. Big Lake sits about 15 miles down the Echo Trail, northwest of Ely.
The community around Crane Lake at the edge of Voyageurs National Park also remains a priority. Crews are working to keep small fires from threatening Crane Lake and the single road that leads there, said Mike Hill with the Minnesota Incident Command System.
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Hill’s group is responsible for the fight against 11 wildfires west of Echo Lake and east of Highway 53, outside the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. He said those fires were relatively small and that crews were “working towards containment on all of them.”
Officials estimated the summer fires have burned some 77,000 acres so far. As in prior briefings, they made it clear they expect to be fighting wildfires through the fall and that the work may not end until it snows.
“Don’t let your guard down,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Phillip Manuel. Despite the recent rain and a wind shift that temporarily cleared the smoke, residents should not get complacent, he told reporters.
The hotter temperatures and wind will return “and we’re going to be right back at it with these fires moving across the landscape,” he said, adding that storms can also bring more lightning, which is likely to trigger more fires.
Among other topics covered in the briefing:
Forest Service crews have made it through about 90 percent of the BWCA to find and alert campers that the wilderness is closed, said Drew Stroberg, acting supervisor of the Superior National Forest. The Forest Service was still tracking one group making its way out. It could take three or four days to finish the sweep of the wilderness, he said.
Stroberg said he wasn’t sure when the BWCA closure might be eased for certain areas and said it’s not likely to be lifted completely any time soon. “We will have active fire on the landscape likely through the rest of the summer, until the snow flies.”
Officials yesterday estimated 400 to 500 firefighters were deployed across the region. On Friday, Paul Lundgren, wildfire section manager for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, said the number is likely in the 600s now. Four Minnesota National Guard helicopters as well as a Minnesota State Patrol helicopter are availabe to support firefighters, he added.
Among the five largest fires, the Thumb Fire has pushed its way into Canada “and has progressed pretty significantly” and “remains largely unstopped,” said Loomis, adding that U.S. authorities were working closely with Canadian officials and First Nations leaders.
After burning “pretty actively,” the Sioux Fire has moderated a bit “but we continue to have progression to the south,” Loomis said.
Loomis indicated more aircraft and elite Hotshot firefighting crews from New Mexico and Mississippi could be deployed if conditions worsened around Big Lake and Echo Trail.
Like other officials, Loomis said the fire conditions he’s seeing are unprecedented for northern Minnesota and that the region’s remote stretches make it particularly difficult to fight fires. “This is the kind of stuff we see in Arizona,” he said, “not in upstate Minnesota.”
