{"id":2463636,"date":"2017-09-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-09-13T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/uncategorized\/living-glacier-during-wildfire\/"},"modified":"2022-05-12T12:36:29","modified_gmt":"2022-05-12T18:36:29","slug":"living-glacier-during-wildfire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/environment\/living-glacier-during-wildfire\/","title":{"rendered":"Living in Glacier During a Massive Wildfire"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve heard that there\u2019s no bad day living in the mountains, but living through wildfires in northwest Montana for the past few weeks has made me question if that\u2019s true. I live at the Polebridge Ranger Station, inside Glacier National Park, and I work on a trail crew for the National Park Service. Two weeks ago, I drove my visiting family seven miles up the road to Bowman Lake for a day of fishing and paddleboarding. I took photos of my sister out in the middle of the perfectly clear water and pointed out crazy rock formations on Chapman Peak, some 15 miles away. We spent the whole day on the lake\u2019s beach while hundreds of other people came and went.<\/p>\n

Today, the lakeshore looked like a scene from Cormac McCarthy\u2019s The Road<\/a><\/em>. The beach was empty, and I couldn\u2019t make out the shoreline more than 250 yards in front of me. My voice sounds like I\u2019ve been smoking rolled cigarettes late into the evenings, and if I stop and think about it, I notice that my throat burns and I\u2019ve had a headache the whole day. A heavy, dry, ashy blanket lies over the entire park\u2014smoke that burns my eyes like a green-wood\u00a0campfire. Yesterday\u2019s air quality rating in the nearby town of Columbia Falls, Montana, reached a particulate matter (PM) level of 278, according to the World Air Quality Index Project<\/a>. That\u2019s nearly three times the 100PM level that is considered hazardous to human health. But there\u2019s no place to get away from it. About 90 miles south of here, the town of Seeley Lake<\/a> has had \u201chazardous\u201d air since August 1 due to wildfires. That\u2019s a month of taking in toxic air with every breath.<\/p>\n

\"\"
(Charlie Ebbers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The fires started burning in Glacier in early August. Most sparked on August 10, the night more than 150 lightning-to-land strikes were reported. The fire crews had a quick response and went to work trying to manage everything that was burning across the vast national park. I worked on the beginning of the Sprague Fire. It was just another small-acreage fire when it started\u2014about four acres on day one\u2014but it\u2019s since grown to 14,750 acres and even burned down <\/a>part of the 100-year-old Sperry Chalet.\u00a0But a tiny spark can set a great forest on fire.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

This summer has been the driest I\u2019ve seen in eight years of working at the park. It\u2019s been drier than my hometown of Albuquerque, New Mexico. August rainfall was recorded at .65 inches compared to the 20-year average of 1.21 inches. Granted, that\u2019s still more than August 2003, when we received only .12 inches of rain and suffered the most heinous fire year for Glacier in recent memory.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to know what\u2019s coming next. Our work truck only gets Canadian radio, and I heard one of their wildland fire managers say to CBC that this is the worst wildland fire year in 60 years. British Columbia has more than 140 fires burning, and Alberta has 17. Waterton National Park, Glacier\u2019s sister park to the north, shut its doors this week due to the 19,000-acre Kenow fire.<\/p>\n

Though I\u2019ve never seen anything like this, I know these mountains have dealt with it before, and I know there are long-term benefits<\/a> because of fires. Fires create snag forests that make for unique wildlife habitat. It\u2019s nature\u2019s burn-and-rebuild model. To live through it, though, is downright oppressive. If the skies were clear, I\u2019d be able to see six fires from my house\u2014some in the park, some in the adjacent national forest, and some on provincial land.<\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t seen any wildlife in three weeks. Usually this time of year I\u2019d see grizzlies, black bears, and elk. Recently, I\u2019ve seen just a few tiny black flies. I\u2019m trying to remain optimistic, and I\u2019m trying to trust that these fires are a vital part of the ecosystem. But right now, it\u2019s no place for people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve heard that there’s no bad day living in the mountains, but living through wildfires in northwest Montana for the past few weeks has made me question if that’s true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44696,"featured_media":2240761,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"uuid":"9a18ce8219e7a085ddcc70d2f116c6ac","footnotes":""},"categories":[2547],"tags":[2822,3299,2962,2624,2804,2831,2727,2706],"byline":[1816],"ad_cat":[],"legacy-category":[],"class_list":["post-2463636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment","tag-bears","tag-glacier-national-park","tag-montana","tag-nature","tag-weather","tag-wildfire","tag-wildland-fire","tag-wildlife","byline-charlie-ebbers"],"acf":[],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"Living in Glacier During a Massive Wildfire","url":"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/environment\/living-glacier-during-wildfire\/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/environment\/living-glacier-during-wildfire\/"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/12\/charlie-ebbers-glacier-fire-smoke-on-the-water_h.jpg","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/12\/charlie-ebbers-glacier-fire-smoke-on-the-water_h.jpg"},"articleSection":"Environment","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"jversteegh"}],"creator":["jversteegh"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Online","logo":"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/favicon-194x194-1.png"},"keywords":["bears","glacier national park","montana","nature","weather","wildfire","wildland fire","wildlife"],"dateCreated":"2017-09-13T00:00:00Z","datePublished":"2017-09-13T00:00:00Z","dateModified":"2022-05-12T18:36:29Z"},"rendered":"