SWEETWATER COUNTY — Hazy skies seen throughout Sweetwater County are the result of fires burning in Utah, one of which has burned more than 40,000 acres.
Rock Springs Fire Chief Jim Wamsley and Sweetwater County Fire District No. 1 said the haze seen is mostly the result of the Iron Fire, south of Eagle Mountain, Utah and located near the southwest corner of Utah Lake. The fire is in Utah, Juab, and Tooele Counties and was at 23% containment as of Thursday morning. There are 664 firefighters working on the fire, combined into 15 crews and utilizing 10 fire engines and five helicopters.
A few fires are burning in Wyoming, the most prominent of which is the Kinky Creek Fire, located in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Teton County, near the border with Sublette County. That fire is estimated to have burned 770 acres so far.
Kitchener said local firefighting agencies have weekly meetings with the Bureau of Land Management to continually assess the fire danger and determine if fire restrictions are needed. Kitchner said restrictions haven’t been discussed, though fire fuels continue to dry in the summer heat.
“Things are definitely drying out, people need to be careful,” Kitchener said.
Wamsley said one of the issues local firefighting groups are aware of is the fact that regional fires can drain local federal resources in the BLM and U.S. Forest Service. Local firefighters would be on the front lines of a wildland fire until more resources can be made available to back them up.
