BANNACK – “That was perfect, Mike, we’ll take another one right through there,” the radio dispatcher said after a helicopter dropped water on the wildfire.
Fire crews, with the help of air support, are busy this week trying to control the Bannack Wildfire burning southwest of Dillon, which is the first major wildfire in Montana that started earlier this week.
“We’re making a lot of progress. The first night it grew to about 150 acres and it hasn’t really grown since then,” said Incident Commander Jackson Spooner.
A lightning strike started the fire about a mile south of Bannack and is burning in rocky terrain of sage, grass, and timber. More than 60 firefighters and two helicopters have been working throughout the day trying to stop the fire from spreading.
“Around noon or a little bit after noon, we’re starting to enter our burning period, the prime time when fire behavior starts to increase, our relative humidity start dropping and our temperatures start to increase. Might start seeing more smoke off the fire, anywhere from this time to about 4 or 5 o’clock in the afternoon,” said Don Copple, the Fire Management Officer for the DNRC.
Flames can be seen in the burn zone of the Bannack fire and there are hotspots all around the area. Crews say they have a handle on the fire, but they’re not ready to say it’s contained.
“We got a lot of spots on the northside of that fire and just getting a handle on those, trying to find them, that’s our biggest challenge,” said Spooner.
Officials said no structures in the area are threatened by the fire and the town of Bannack remains open for business.
