This is a report on fires occurring in Division of Alaska Forestry & Fire Protection northern and coastal areas. These include the DOF protection areas of Kenai/Kodiak, Southwest, Mat-Su, Valdez/Copper River, Fairbanks, Delta, and Tok.
There was one new fire reported Friday in DOF’s protection areas, it was located at the base of Knik Glacier. DOF Mat-Su launched helitack which located the tenth of an acre fire. Picnic Strip Fire (#363) is an abandoned campfire that had escaped into the wildland torching a single tree. Helitack crewmembers cold trailed the burned area and found no heat or smoke. They contained, controlled and declared the fire out.
Cool temperatures and rain showers will continue into early next week for Southwest Alaska. Rain is expected to continue for most locations across Southcentral and Kenai Peninsula Saturday and will gradually decrease on Sunday. Scattered rain and showers will remain in the forecast into next week for Southcentral and move into the Copper River basin. Temperatures will warm in the Interior with a Chinook flow resulting in gusty winds in the Alaska Range passes. Wind advisories are in effect for the Eastern Alaska range. A chance of showers or thunderstorms will persist over the Interior early next week.
Burn Permits are suspended Saturday in the Delta West zone of the DOF Delta Prevention area due to high winds and dry conditions. Burn Permits are required statewide Saturday in all other DOF protection areas but call your local Burn Permit Hotline as conditions change. Valid Burn Permits allow residents to conduct small debris burns, utilize burn barrels and complete small lawn burns. More information about the DOF Burn Permit program and current suspensions can be found at https://dnr.alaska.gov/burn
DOF continues to staff two fires.
Montana Creek Fire (#312) – 16 miles south of Talkeetna, the Montana Creek Fire remains at 159 acres with full containment. The DOF Gannett Glacier Fire Crew has been steadily progressing in their final operations. On Friday, they continued their gridding of the fire area, ensuring no residual heat spots remain. Gridding in fire operations involves searching the affected fire area in a grid pattern to locate and extinguish any remaining hotspots. The crew will continue to search the entire fire area through Saturday.
Gold King Creek Fire (#276) – located 46 miles south of Fairbanks in a limited response area and is estimated to be 6,134 acres. 28 personnel are assigned. An airplane carried 8,000 pounds of excess equipment and supplies off the fire Friday. Minor fire growth was reported on the northern side of the fire. A squad of Fairbanks 1 Crew have been deployed to the fire to assist in backhaul operations. Chugachmiut Yukon Crew and a portion of the Uncrewed Aerial System (UAS/drone) Module have been released from the incident and will return to their base Saturday. The Fairbanks 1 squad will remain on the fire, testing and maintaining the pumps and hose lay system in place for structure protection for the cabin community of Gold King. The fire has not received much precipitation lately and concerns for an increase in fire activity still remain. A Temporary Flight Restriction is in place over the Gold King Creek Fire for the safe operation of firefighting aircraft. Pilots should check here, https://tfr.faa.gov/, before flying in the area.
Categories: Active Wildland Fire, Alaska DNR - Division of Forestry (DOF)
Alaska Wildland Fire Information 