Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — Now that the Hinman fire is 100 percent contained, fire officials are turning their attention to rehabilitating the forest.

The fire burned 1,446 acres 23 miles north of Steamboat Springs between the Coulton Creek and Hinman drainages.

A burn area emergency rehabilitation team will decide what steps to take to prevent erosion in the burn area, Forest Service spokeswoman Diann Pipher said.

A few firefighters have remained to complete mop-up efforts.

"We will continue to monitor the area until we're certain that it's totally out," Pipher said.

Recent smoke observed over Steamboat is not the result of any new or old fires in the area, she said.

Forest Service officials believe the smoke is coming from the North Barcus fire between Rangely and Meeker and a fire near Carbondale.

The North Barcus fire lies a half-mile south of U.S. 64 and 20 miles east of Rangely. Four hotshot crews of 20 personnel each have been assigned to the 4,200-acre fire. Personnel include the Pike Hotshots, the Tatanka Hotshots, the Yampa Valley 2 crew and a crew from southern Wyoming.

Some resources assigned to the North Barcus fire were reassigned to fight the 1,590-acre Panorama fire northeast of Carbondale, which is 95 percent contained. It has destroyed four homes and forced the evacuation of 200 homes.

Authorities think sparks from a construction crew's saw might have caused the fire. Lightning caused the fire near Rangely and is burning sagebrush and old-growth piforest.

Forest Service officials flew over the Green Creek area Thursday and spotted a few smoky areas, Pipher said.

The Green Creek fire is now 75 percent contained and has burned 2,414 acres in the Sarvis Creek Wilderness.

Fire officials will continue to monitor the fire by air and expect it to be fully contained when a season-ending event, such as a heavy rain or snow, comes along, she said.

The 1,700-acre Lost Lakes fire and the 50-acre Big Fish fire, both in the Flat Tops Wilderness area, have not been contained because fire officials are allowing them to burn within a predetermined area.

The Routt and White River national forests are jointly managing the fires.

"They're just filling nature's role for fire in the ecological burning of old beetle-kill timber and making way for the new trees," Pipher said.

Because the timber is still drying out from last week's rains, the fires are only slowly creeping along, she said.