Mopping up on Sentinel: Crews work to douse last of 390-acre fire on mountainside
By TRISTAN SCOTT of the Missoulian
Crews were close Thursday evening to buttoning up a 390-acre wildfire that charred Mount Sentinel's western slope, but firefighters continued to dry-mop hot spots that smoldered in heavy timber near the mountaintop.
“Yay! We're all so happy,” said Cindy Super, fire prevention coordinator and information officer for the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation. “Things are definitely lying down, and we're very optimistic. We've accomplished everything we wanted to this morning and afternoon.”
Fire bosses said the blaze was fully contained late Thursday evening. Three engines were to spend Thursday night patrolling hot spots on the hill, just below the areas of thick timber, authorities said.
Michael Bowman and daughter Brooke Bowman, 4, watch as a firefighting helicopter scoops water from the Clark Fork River Thursday morning. Three helicopters took turns dropping water on the charred mountain. Photo by LINDA THOMPSON/Missoulian
“What we have ahead of us now is a seek-and-destroy type mission,” Super said. “We'll get into the heavy timber and find all the little bits and pieces that were missed. That requires primarily time and tenacity.”
A pair of water-blasting helicopters will resume the onslaught Friday morning, Super said, adding that officials have already sent one chopper home.
Two boys playing with cigarette lighters are to blame for the wildfire, which started around 7 p.m. Wednesday at the base of Sentinel, behind the University of Montana's married student housing complex, according to Missoula fire inspectors Gordy Hughes and Tony Goeres.
The siblings, ages 7 and 8, apparently stole the lighters from a car and were igniting bunches of pages from a phone book, then snuffing out the blazes with rocks. The last fire was the biggest and it got out of hand, Hughes said. The boys panicked and ran from the scene.
The culprits were cited for criminal mischief and negligent arson in Missoula Youth Court, and will undergo juvenile counseling and attend the city's fire setter's intervention program, investigators said. A youth court judge could order the boys' families to pay restitution for the firefighting costs, but it's not clear whether that will happen.
“It's definitely possible,” said Assistant Fire Chief Jason Diehl. “The state and city clearly have the option to pursue compensation, but we haven't really talked about it yet.”
Projected costs of the firefighting and other resources fell at around $225,000, said Mike Kopitzke, fire program manager for the DNRC. Initial fire-suppression efforts were about $175,000, he said, while continued monitoring of the hot spots will likely cost an additional $50,000.
“That's a ballpark figure. It's the best we have right now,” Kopitzke said.
The state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation took the lead on the fire Thursday morning, working with around 130 firefighters, a pod of 11 smokejumpers from the U.S. Forest Service, three helicopters, two Hotshot crews from the Bitterroot and Lolo national forests and at least six engines.
The resources converged on Mount Sentinel early Thursday morning to knock down the blaze before red-flag winds gained momentum in the afternoon. Forceful attacks from hand crews and air support were critical to the fire-suppression efforts, officials said.
“We're working to make sure this fire is totally extinguished before winds pick up this afternoon,” said Missoula Fire Chief Tom Steenberg.
“We hit it hard this morning when it was nice and cool and when I left it was looking real good,” Kopitzke said.
As of Thursday evening, all trail access points to the mountain were closed, including the “M” trail up the face of the mountain and the trail accesses at Crazy Canyon and Pattee Canyon. The Kim Williams Trail near Mount Sentinel along the Clark Fork River is open, but access to the Hellgate Trail, which goes up the north side of Mount Sentinel off the Kim Williams Trail, is closed.
Still, hand crews had to contend with people hiking and riding on horseback through the blackened area.
“People keep appearing,” Super said in the afternoon. “It's pretty surprising for helicopters or hand crews to turn around and see some random guy in shorts and a T-shirt.”
Diehl stressed that conditions are dry, and hikers could easily be trapped on the mountain by the fast-moving flames. Hikers who attempt to use Mount Sentinel trails to view the fire are putting themselves in danger.
“As we saw last night, the fire danger is high,” Diehl said. “I don't care what kind of shape you're in, that's steep enough and burning fast enough that you don't want to be up there. The fire went up that slope faster than anyone could hike it.”
The Missoula Ranger District also closed both the Pattee Canyon Picnic Area and Pattee Canyon Folf Course indefinitely, as fire operations are based at the picnic area, which is 3 1/2 miles southeast of Missoula.
Morgan Valliant, Missoula's conservation lands manager, asked people to consider the speed of this fire's spread when they are disappointed by longer closures of public lands later in the fire season.
“This is serious business,” he said in a press release. “The reason we close public lands later in the season is people can get trapped by fire.”
Super said fire bosses made a conscious decision not to put crews atop the mountain when the fire began its run Wednesday night. Without air support immediately available - the nearest air tanker was in Idaho - flames spread quickly through grass and brush.
“Last night, with it running up the hill, there was nobody at the top. It was kind of a wait-and-hope,” Super said. “Fire likes to run to the top of the ridge, so we didn't want to risk putting someone at the top.”
A helicopter dipping a 400-gallon bucket into the Clark Fork River was on the scene within 30 minutes, and quickly made serious inroads against the blaze.
Local fire officials will meet next week to assess wildfire conditions, Steenberg said. He expects the fire danger will increase to very high or extreme by then.
Missoula Parks Superintendent Rob Thames estimated that about half of the land affected by the fire is city-owned, while half is property of the University of Montana. A small amount of private property may also be affected.
Thames was mapping and assaying the area Thursday morning, looking at possibilities for revegetation in the area.
The 2006 fire on Mount Jumbo proved that without human help, burned areas grow back with pockets of undesirable cheatgrass. Thames would like to avoid the same effect after this fire, but the effort will require financing since it is not included in the Parks Department's budget.
“We learned a lot from that 2006 fire,” Thames said in the release. “This might just be a real opportunity to do revegetation.”
Reporter Tristan Scott can be reached at 523-5264 or at tscott@missoulian.com.
