Valley Mill fire nearly contained

The 460-acre Valley Mill fire near Chewelah that destroyed four homes earlier this week was about 75 percent contained Thursday evening, officials said.

“We expect by tomorrow the percentage will change,” said Roland Emetaz, information officer for the Central Washington incident management team. “We got some precipitation and had some cooler temperatures, and that helps.”

About 200 firefighters remained at the wildfire site.

“The firefighters still have a lot of work to do,” Emetaz said.

The wildfire, which authorities say was caused by someone burning trash, started at a residence on Highway 231 six miles south of Chewelah, fire officials said. The fire was considered an “illegal burn” because of a burn ban that’s in effect. Criminal charges against the people who were burning trash are possible.

Initial reports that the Valley Mill fire had destroyed seven to nine homes were incorrect.

Emetaz said the reason for the discrepancy could be that often during initial attack, it’s hard to see. “There’s a lot of smoke and hot fire, and some of the observations are made from the air, and some outbuildings can be mistaken for residences,” he said. “Numbers in acreage often change for the same reason.”

The tally Thursday was four homes and 14 outbuildings, Emetaz said.

In the Idaho Panhandle, a fire was extinguished Thursday in the popular timber-covered Tubbs Hill park on Lake Coeur d’Alene. It was the second human-caused fire in four days in the park.

Also in Idaho, firefighters were trying to cut off a new fire in the Sawtooth Mountains before it merges with the raging Potato fire, a 14-square-mile timber blaze that is still far from contained more than two weeks after it broke out.

The Zane fire was started by lightning Monday and had grown to more than 200 acres by Thursday. It was a mile and a half off the eastern flank of the Potato fire and crews were trying to build fire line in the steep terrain to keep the two from joining.

Meanwhile, fire crews made progress against a pair of wildfires that have consumed 75,770 acres in north central Washington’s remote Chewuch Valley. The Tripod and Spur Peak fires were 20 percent contained, about double the amount from Wednesday, firefighters said. The fires grew by about 1,000 acres Wednesday night and have burned some 117 square miles of national forest land northeast of Winthrop.

The fires burned together Tuesday and began spreading into the Loomis State Forest this week. No homes were in imminent danger of burning, although people in the Winthrop area were asked by fire officials to be on the alert in case conditions change.

There were 2,075 firefighters assigned to the blazes. Both the Tripod and Spur Peak fires were caused by lightning strikes in July.

In Central Washington, the Flick Creek fire near Stehekin on Lake Chelan was 30 percent contained and held steady at 4,200 acres, or about 6.5 square miles, on Thursday.

About a dozen firefighters remained on the scene.