News
Crater Ridge Fire Extinguished
Published
3 years agoon
A fire that had been burning in the Big Horn National Forest northwest of Sheridan for almost five months is no more.
As of 8am Friday (December 10th), fire officials from the Big Horn National Forest, Medicine Wheel Ranger District declared the Crater Ridge Fire has been extinguished.
The fire started in mid-July and burned nearly 7,700 acres of forest land.
Due to the terrain in the area, fire crews had difficulty getting to some areas of the fire.
It was 100 percent contained in mid-October, but contained doesn’t mean the fire was out.
Fully contained means crews were confident that the fire would not cross over any containment area that had been established.
A few areas in the forest are still closed as a result of fire activity.
A forest ranger spokesperson says dozer lines and temporary roads need to be rehabilitated and hazard trees along open roads need to be cut down.
Remains of the burned cow camp may also be a danger to the public and need to be removed.
It may take crews into next summer to complete all necessary fire rehabilitation before the closure can be lifted.
Mark Steingass
December 10, 2021 at 11:34 am
…this fire and other fires around the USA was a poor performance in fire eradication effort…more manpower, bigger better equipment along with a specially designated mobile federal firefighting force (FFF) needs to be considered and funded by congress…if we can’t stop the effects of global warming we need to establish the ability to extinguish fires expediently
Scott Thomas
December 10, 2021 at 12:44 pm
Or, you could put it out when you discovered it…instead of watching it for over a week before you did anything… Wonder how that would have sped things up. Yeah, building a new, large federal government department to solve problems locally sounds like an effective and efficient solution. You had a CH-47 sitting here for two months… is a pretty big asset. I bet Billing Flying Service sent the head ranger a new pickup instead of just a Christmas card!
Mark Steingass
December 11, 2021 at 8:22 am
agreed…extinguish fires promptly…problem is wildland fires are now more frequent and have changed in nature with relation to dramatic changes in climate and outdated fire equipment not fully capable for the new challenges…local fire capabilities around the country aren’t capable of working fires in the tough steep terrains so more federal help is needed…new direct fire attack equipment needs to be developed for the new challenges that have evolved globally