Fire near Glacier National Park doubles in size

Karl Puckett | Great Falls (Mont.) Tribune

ST. MARY, Mont. — A fast-moving fire in thick timber fueled by brisk winds in Glacier National Park doubled in size Wednesday, sending massive plumes of smoke into the sky and disrupted vacation plans for thousands of visitors.

“We’re in limbo,” said LaRee Prather of Augusta, Ga., who was taking photos with her husband, Ron, at the St. Mary Visitor Center entrance to the park, which has been closed to the public.

The couple arrived in St. Mary on Wednesday morning with plans to stay two days, but they weren’t sure what they would do now with the fire moving toward this small tourist town on the edge of the park.

Additional precautionary evacuations were ordered as a result of the fire, including the St. Mary Visitor Center and National Park Service administrative area here.

All interpretive programs in the St. Mary Valley were canceled until further notice, and there’s a temporary flight restriction over the fire area.

The National Park Service said the fire has burned one structure, a historic patrol cabin near Baring Falls.

St. Mary and Rising Sun campgrounds and the Sun Motor Inn were previously evacuated. Officials evacuated the small community of St. Mary and homes along nearby St. Mary Lake on Wednesday afternoon as a precaution against the approaching fire.

“It will be a difficult fire,” said Andy Huntsberger, the incident commander for the team fighting the blaze. “But I would say many fires in the northern Rockies are different because of fuels.”

Because of extremely dry conditions and the wind, the potential for the fire to grow is high, he said.

As of Wednesday evening, the fire had grown from 2,000 to 4,000 acres, more than 6 square miles, and was burning west to east.

“This will knock a hole in the annual amount of people who go through here,” said Jim Cassidy of Babb, seated in a pickup truck with friend Roger Anderson, who was visiting from Massachusetts, commenting on the fire’s disruption of travel plans.

The men were watching the smoke show along with other motorists who pulled off to the side of the road.

Glacier park remains open, but Going-to-the-Sun Road, the main artery through the heart of the park, is closed between the St. Mary entrance on the east side and Big Bend on the west side. The road, an engineering marvel, spans 50 miles through the park’s wild interior, winding around mountainsides and treating visitors to some of the best sights in Montana.

Huntsberger’s team was expected to be replaced Thursday by a team equipped to handle the most complex fires.

“We’ve had very high winds the last couple of days, Huntsberger said. “That has definitely made the fire grow rapidly.”

Firefighters are working in particularly tough conditions because of the steep and rocky terrain, he said.

About 15 engines and four 20-person crews were on the fire Wednesday, along with two helicopters that dropped water from buckets filled from St. Mary Lake on the flames.

Additional air and ground resources have been ordered, including three additional hand crews and 15 engines and five more helicopters.

“That’s really thick,” Patrick Czerny of Rapid City, S.D. said as he and his wife, Pam, stood near their Harley Davidson motorcycle watching smoke billow over snowcapped peaks.

“Boy, that’s just not cool,” Pam Czerny said.

Wednesday morning, rangers were helping visitors retrieve vehicles they were forced to leave behind on Going-to-the-Sun Road because of fire activity in the area. One vehicle was consumed by the fire.

Officials were continuing to account for all backcountry hikers by searching the area, Huntsberger said.

St. Mary is located on the eastern side of Glacier National Park and the western edge of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation. The small community of fewer than 100 people grows in the summer with the influx of visitors.

The fire and evacuations come at the peak of tourism season for the park, which drew 2.3 million visitors in 2014. July is busiest month of the year. In 2014, almost 700,000 people visited the park in July.

The cause of the fire continues to be investigated, a park official said.

Contributing: The Associated Press.