The Idaho Department of Lands began battling fires in May 2015.
The first of Boundary County's two big wildfires, the Baker's Camp Fire, started with lightning strikes in the Smith Creek area when a storm passed through on June 29. That fire went on to burn approximately 50 acres before being brought under control.
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One month after lightning started the Baker's Camp Fire, another lightning storm ignited Boundary County's second big summer wildfire, the Parker Ridge fire. A little over two weeks after it began, the Parker Ridge Fire had expanded to nearly 2,000 acres. On August 14, it broke out, crossing the West Side Road, and ultimately sweeping across Boundary County's northern Kootenai Valley, jumping the Kootenai River, and forcing evacuations of homes in the Porthill and Farm to Market areas. By the end of August the Parker Ridge fire had burned approximately 6,600 acres.
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Read on for a feature story put together by the Idaho Department of Lands about the record-setting 2015 fire season.
A look back at the 2015 fire season
by the Idaho Department of Lands
Last year, 2015, had a five-month long fire season—one of the worst on record for northern Idaho.
The Idaho Department of Lands (IDL) and two timber protective associations fought fires beginning in May 2015, and were still mopping up fires toward the end of October. Together we have put out close to 300 fires that burned 75,000 acres, racking up close to $80 million in fire suppression costs, about $60 million of which Idaho taxpayers will pay.
Nearly half the fires we fought were human caused.
The total number of fires on lands protected by the State of Idaho was a fairly typical 89 percent of the 20-year average, while the number of acres burned was huge—594 percent of the 20-year average.
The vast majority of wildfires are put out before they reach ten acres. However, the fires that escape initial attack cost taxpayers the most money to suppress. That's particularly true when the fires require the use of an incident management team. Fourteen IDL fires required the use of 27 incident management teams. The teams are interagency groups of fire management professionals specially trained and experienced in managing complex wildfires.
Agencies order a team when a fire escapes initial attack and is expected to exceed the agency's local district resources. There are high costs associated with the use of Type 1 and Type 2 incident management teams.
Among the largest, most expensive fires was the Clearwater Complex fires that destroyed 48 homes and 70 other buildings near Kamiah in Idaho County last August. Those fires cost more than $25 million to suppress and burned more than 68,000 acres.
A total of 63 residences and 79 other structures were lost this year in fires fought by the State of Idaho.
Approximately 740,000 acres burned across the state in 2015, nearly 80 percent owned and managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management, Idaho's two largest land managers.
Approximately 28,000 acres of endowment lands managed by IDL burned. Of that, 7,000 acres of endowment timber land burned, creating opportunities to make more money for public schools through 15 planned fire salvage sales that will produce 88 million board feet of timber and 5,500 acres of
regenerated forests into the future. The other 1,500 acres of forested endowment lands that burned are too rocky and steep, or hold minimal volume, to be cut and then replanted.
