By Jeff Seidel
Detroit Free Press
NEWBERRY, Mich. — There were clear blue skies above the Sleeper Lake forest fire this afternoon — no visible smoke — but it smoldered deep in the soil, a dangerous point for the Upper Penisula fire.
“This is a really critical point,” said Randy McKenzie, the incident commander. “All we need is a wind from a different direction and a dry day and it’s off and running.”
A smoldering fire is like a sleeping giant. “You can’t just let it smolder,” he said. “With the right winds, it can send a spark across the fire line. When you least expect it, it’s gonna jump up and take off.”
The fire has consumed an estimated 18,387 acres in Luce County, 6.5 miles north of the Village of Newberry. The fire — one of the biggest in recent history in the UP — is considered to be 50 percent contained.
“If the fire gets out and heads south, it’s heading for residences,” McKenzie said. “It’s heading for Newberry.”
About 230 firefighters on hand will start to use different tactics later this week, reducing the heavy equipment and bigger bulldozers but increasing the hand crews. Five crews of 20 have been requested, McKenzie said, to reach areas where vehicles can’t go.
“You can see the fire burning, but you can’t get there because there is a marsh,” McKenzie said. “You get out there with a dozer and your dozer sinks. All those issues and challenges, it’s like knives being thrown at you.”
McKenzie, a 30-year DNR veteran, took over as incident commander this morning.
McKenzie replaced Rich Ahnen, who was expected to take a few days off, to rest and recover, but he will return later in the week.
“We have this thing just about where we want it,” McKenzie said, something Ahnen credits the firefighters for accomplishing.
On Sunday, strong winds blew the fire over the containment line, but the fire fighters were able to stop it. “The wind challenged us on Sunday,” McKenzie said. “We caught the spot and we hope we can continue that operation.”
The fire has been difficult to battle because of the complex terrain, which includes marshland and hardwood ridges.
Three Blackhawk helicopters and one Chinook helicopter from the Michigan Army National Guard are being used. As of Monday morning, the helicopters had flown 1,198 sorties, dropped more than 1 million 1,001,440 gallons of water on the fire.
For the most part, the helicopters are dropping water on hot spots near the containment line. The pilots are being told to let the fire burn out in the middle, to reduce the available fire fuel.
The fire is not expected to be out, completely, until snowfall.
Copyright 2007 Detroit Free Press
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