Firefighters busy in U.S. forests
Containment work underway in both Ozark, Ouachita tracts
Two fires that scorched 1,000 acres of national forestland in western Arkansas were still burning Monday as dry conditions caused wildfire warnings across the state.
Those two fires, both in remote areas, will burn about 2,900 acres before they are brought under control, said Tracy Farley, a spokesman for the Ouachita and Ozark-St. Francis national forests.
By that time, the fires will have reached barriers such as creeks and roads as well as perimeter lines being dug by firefighters, Farley said. No structures are threatened by the fires, and no injuries have been reported.
Farley was referring to the 512-acre Tom’s Mill fire near Hagarville in Johnson County and the 490-acre Forked fire in the Flatside Wilderness near Hollis in Perry County.
The Tom’s Mill fire, which is in the Ozark National ForLittle
est, started Saturday and will burn about 2,000 acres before it is brought under control, Farley said. Its cause is unknown at this point.
The Forked fire in the Ouachita National Forest started Nov. 21 and will burn about 900 acres before it is brought under control, Farley said. Its cause was human, but Farley said she couldn’t elaborate because both fires are under investigation.
“Primarily, the fires on the forest are typically human caused,” she said.
The two fires are about 50 miles apart, with Russellville about midway between them. The Ozark and Ouachita mountains are generally separated by the Arkansas River Valley and Interstate 40.
The Ouachita National Forest covers 1.8 million acres in central Arkansas and southeastern Oklahoma. The Ozark National Forest covers 1.2 million acres, mostly in the Ozark Mountains of northern Arkansas.
Farley said about 20 firefighters were working Monday to contain the Tom’s Mill fire and about 40 were working on the Forked fire, which was named for Forked Mountain and is about 60 percent contained.
Farley said the Flatside Wilderness is closed, as are roads there. Some roads are temporarily closed in the vicinity of the Tom’s Mill fire, particularly around Pilot Rock Mountain.
“Due to extremely dry conditions, forest visitors should be extra vigilant in managing campfires and use caution when traveling around the Pilot Rock area with the increased fire suppression traffic,” Farley said in a news release.
The National Weather Service is predicting a 40 percent chance of rain Wednesday. Fifty-seven percent of Arkansas — including the entire
southwest quarter — is experiencing severe drought, according to drought.gov.
“We would like a good, slow-soaking, widespread rain,” Farley said. “We’ve had above-normal temperatures, below-normal relative humidity and the drought indices are relatively high. So we’re seeing definitely an increase in fire activity.”
Farley said winds have been relatively calm, and the fires are mainly burning leaves that have fallen on the ground.
“We’ve been fairly fortunate in that the winds have not been too severe,” she said. “When the winds get in the mix, it tends to drive the fires faster. … Most of the leaves have fallen off the hardwood trees so you don’t have a lot of burnable material up in the canopy.”
Farley said the fires probably aren’t killing many trees.
“In some areas, it may kill some isolated trees,” she said.
The fire containment status can be monitored at inciweb.nwcg.gov.
For the week that ended Saturday, there were 14 fires that burned 634 acres in the Ouachita Natural Forest and four fires that burned 64 acres in the Ozark Natural Forest, Farley said. Sixty of those 64 Ozark acres were attributed to the Tom’s Mill fire.
Since Saturday, one fire in each forest has been controlled but more fires may have started, said Farley.
Fires are contained within a perimeter before they are brought under control, said Farley.
The Arkansas Agriculture Department’s Forestry Commission suppressed 103 wildfires that burned 1,805 acres of private land in Arkansas from Thursday through 3 p.m. Sunday, according to news release. Adriane Barnes, a spokesman for the commission, said all fires reported were suppressed during that time.
More than 120 rangers, foresters and support personnel responded to the wildfires over the long holiday weekend, according to the news release.
Fifty-nine of Arkansas’ 75 counties were under “high wildfire danger” and 33 counties had burn bans by late Monday, according to the commission.
“Gov. Asa Hutchinson joins State Forester Joe Fox in strongly encouraging residents to avoid outdoor burning until the wildfire danger conditions subside,” the release said.
So far in November, 196 wildfires have burned 3,106 acres of private land, according to the Forestry Commission. For the year to date, 1,288 wildfires have burned 22,849 acres.
“The most recent high wildfire year in Arkansas was 2012, when 2,148 wildfires burned 34,434 acres,” according to the release.
More information on burn bans and wildfire danger is available at arkfireinfo.org.