Alaska Division of Forestry

The burn suspension on the Kenai Peninsula has been lifted as of noon today.

The Division of Forestry prohibited burning earlier this week due to dry conditions and hot temperatures. But it said cooler temperatures and forecasted rain have since decreased the wildland fire hazard locally.

Dry conditions and hot temperatures have turned up the wildfire risk on the Kenai Peninsula this week. The Alaska Division of Forestry issued a burn suspension, effective today.

By this time last year, the Kenai Peninsula was starving for rain. This year, we’re getting plenty of it, and that’s keeping wildfires down.

Wildfire danger is low enough that the Alaska Division of Forestry is comfortable sending Alaska’s fire crews out of state to help with fires burning in the Lower 48. Division of Forestry Public Information Officer Tim Mowry said that includes the Kenai Peninsula’s Yukon Crew.

Most of the Kenai Peninsula, and most of Southcentral Alaska, is covered by what’s called boreal forest. The forests are dominated by birch, cottonwood, alder and spruce, as well as a handful of other species. That's not a huge amount of biodiversity but boreal forests are home to several different kinds of spruce trees.

On the western peninsula, it’s mostly black spruce, which are the spindly, Nightmare Before Christmas-esque conifer trees growing in wetlands. But white spruce also grow in the Kenai-Soldotna area.

The first ghost of the Swan Lake Fire showed up on Tuesday east of Soldotna.

With big wildland fires that burn deep into the terrain, pockets of hot material can remain, even into the next year. These hotspots can then ignite and cause a secondary burn, called a holdover fire.

Spring and summer weather gets people out of their houses and working on their property, preparing their homes for wildfire season, clearing trees. But it is not the time to cut live spruce trees.

This is the time of year when spruce bark beetles move from infested trees and fly to new host trees. From mid-May until mid-July when temperatures are above 60° F, the beetles move from the layer between the bark and wood of infested trees, seeking new trees to lay their eggs. Howard Kent is the Fire Management Officer for the Kenai/Kodiak Office of the Division of Forestry.

Firefighters responded to a small grass fire in the Kasilof area yesterday along K-Beach Road. According to the Alaska interaction Coordination Center, a caller reported that a bald eagle struck a power line and caused a spark to fall and ignite the grass in the ditch below.

The Alaska Division of Forestry put out a small wildfire that started on Penny Lane between Soldotna and Sterling on Thursday night.

The fire started in a mobile home on Penny Lane, on the Soldotna side of Longmere Lake around 3:45 p.m. Thursday. Central Emergency Services responded, and the Alaska Division of Forestry got involved when the fire spread from the mobile home to the wildlands nearby. The fire began spreading toward nearby homes and buildings, including a 500-gallon fuel tank.

With the coronavirus pandemic creating difficulty in getting wildland firefighting personnel and equipment to the state this year, not to mention challenges in training and housing crews with social distancing requirements, the Alaska Division of Forestry wants to prevent human-caused fires as much as possible.

Couple that with the fact that spring conditions in between snowmelt and green-up create high fire danger, Forestry issued a statewide burn ban that went into effect Friday.

Apparently, that message was not very well received, as Forestry responded to 14 wildfires around the state over the weekend. Most were the result of burning activities that are now banned, including burn barrels and debris piles.

Alaska Division of Forestry firefighters responded to two small fires on the Kenai Peninsula on Thursday. The Robinson Fire, near Sterling, started from an escaped debris burn that ignited nearby grass Thursday afternoon. It was quickly brought under control but is a reminder that fire season is upon us. Even though snow covered the ground not long along, warm days and wind are drying things out quickly, especially before green-up.

In Homer, firefighters put out an escaped debris burn on Grewingk Street off Skyline Drive on Thursday afternoon.

The Kenai Peninsula had its first wildfire of the season Wednesday

Firefighters from the Alaska Division of Forestry and Homer Volunteer Fire Department responded to a small grass fire off East End Road near Homer on Wednesday afternoon.

A person on the scene told firefighters he had discarded a cigarette butt in the grass and put it out with his foot. He left and came back a few minutes later and saw the grass burning, so called the fire department, which in turn called Forestry.

A cool weekend with some scattered rain showers helped slow the progress of the Swan Lake fire. Total acreage count remained steady over the weekend at about 160,000 and more than 700 personnel remain on the fire.

A new wildfire erupted Sunday evening. Firefighters and aircraft responded quickly and were aggressively fighting the new, small fire near the North Fork Road in Anchor Point. The fire flared up around 6:30 p.m. about 1.5 miles east of the Sterling Highway at mile 164.

Two helicopters with water buckets and 20 firefighters from Alaska Division of Forestry, Kachemak Emergency Services and the Anchor Point Fire & Emergency departments are working the fire. The Type 2 Initial Attack Yukon Crew is joining the effort today.

The 160-square-mile Swan Lake Fire that scorched the black spruce forest and muskeg northeast of Sterling this summer is still holding on. Only 16 firefighters are currently assigned to Swan Lake, most in reseeding and repair work, however helicopters are still in use to cool off hot spots that pop up.
This week several such flare-ups occurred on the hillside above the Sterling Highway near Upper Jean Lake and the Skyline Trail.

Fire managers held another community meeting in Cooper Landing last (Wed.) night. Residents were updated on the Swan Lake Fire's progress since the last meeting on Friday. Cool, moist marine air has dampened the 100,000 acre blaze and reduced its intensity, if not the smoke.
Residents were told how the terrain and weather is resulting in a lot of "low intensity" burning in tundra, bogs and muskeg.

Firefighters were able to complete some key objectives on the Swan Lake fire burning on the Kenai Peninsula Thursday. 

When the Incident Command team running operations on the Swan Lake fire met with community members last week, it was the number two priority fire in the state. Since then, total personnel working just outside Sterling has almost doubled.

Firefighting efforts were focused on keeping the Swan Lake Fire away from a major Homer Electric Association transmission line Tuesday.

  The Swan Lake Fire near Sterling had minimal growth over the weekend, as cooler, wetter weather prevailed. The latest report from the state Division of Forestry says the size of the fire is estimated at 12,782 acres, an increase of only about 200 acres from Friday.

  A pair of 20-member firefighting crews have joined the effort to keep the Swan Lake fire, burning near Sterling, contained. The crew compliment now numbers 67 and more are on the way.

  The Swan Lake Fire northeast of Sterling continues to burn at a moderate pace, according to fire managers. It doubled in size again overnight, to almost 7,000 acres, or 11 square miles. 

The Division of Forestry has been keeping an eye on the wildfire, but allowed it to burn unimpeded as it headed further away from the community and highway. This latest expansion, though, has forced Forestry’s hand, and they are bringing in two 20-person firefighting crews today (Thursday) to begin work on securing the southwest corner of the fire.

Fire crews were able to get a good handle on multiple fires burning around the Kenai Peninsula over the weekend. By late Friday, the 176 acre Tustumena Lake fire was called fully contained.