Yellowstone Fire Will Burn Through September, Portion Of National Park Lake Currently Closed

Every year, more than 3 million people visit America’s first national park. Yellowstone National Park—which sits in the middle of Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho—is known for its incredible vistas, wildlife, and the awesome power of its geysers and hot springs. Due to the dry weather during the summer months in Yellowstone, fires are a common occurrence and a necessary part of the life cycle of the pine forests. Even though wildfires are an important and natural phenomenon, they can still be dangerous. This year, a wildfire dubbed the “June Fire” has grown to over 2,000 acres and is expected to burn until the end of September.

Yellowstone Insider reports that the fire is 13 miles from Yellowstone’s east entrance in Shoshone National Forest. The concern is not so much putting out the fire, but containing it and preventing it from threatening public roads and private property. Currently, they have been forced to close part of Yellowstone Lake to all watercraft for water scooping efforts to combat the blaze.

A public meeting was held Friday night in Cody, Wyoming and officials stated that they had upgraded the fire’s classification from a type III to type II. Fire management duties will be turned over to Rocky Mountain Incident Management Team Black. The next steps taken, they said, will be the construction of fire lines to the north of the June Fire to protect U.S. Highway 14/16/20. Team Black had originally hoped to use Buffalo Bill Reservoir as the fill-up location for their Super Scoopers, but the reservoir contained too much debris to be useful and forced the fire crews to use Yellowstone Lake.

As of now, the National Park is open and only the parts of Yellowstone Lake needed for water scooping have been closed on account of the fire.

Yellowstone Fire Facts

Fire is a natural part of Yellowstone’s ecosystem. The ecosystem needs fire to clear out underbrush, giving valuable living space to the many plants and animals that call Yellowstone their home. Fire not only removes underbrush but also gives much-needed nutrients to the soil.

On average, Yellowstone experiences 27 fires lit by lightning strikes every year. The vast majority of these, however, never reach a size greater than 0.25 acres.

Every day, park officials have to make decisions whether or not to put fires out or let them burn. Allowing certain fires to burn is a necessary part of fire management. Without controlled fires, underbrush builds up and when a fire inevitably happens it becomes much more dangerous.

Much of the National Park Service’s understanding of fire management comes from the Yellowstone Fire of 1988, which was the worst fire in Yellowstone’s recorded history.

Yellowstone Fire of 1988

In summer of 1988, a fire started which ended up burning approximately 800,000 acres of Yellowstone National Park. It was by far the worst fire ever seen in Yellowstone, coming within 50 feet of Cook City, Montana. The fire burned for several months and required over 25,000 people and $120 million in firefighting efforts. Summer of 1988 was particularly dry in Yellowstone and a number of small fires joined together and defied all computer models.

The press was harsh on the Parks Service, with many questioning if the 1988 fire meant the death of Yellowstone National Park. After the September snowfall, the mood lightened considerably as the park’s rapid recovery became apparent.

The Yellowstone Fire of 1988 was a moment that changed The National Park Service’s fire policy, and through its lessons probably prevented more damage than it caused. Since then, the biggest year for fires in Yellowstone was 2016 with 63,000 acres burned.

[Featured Image by Tannen Maury/AP Images]