Live bloging the WTIP morning show

• 40% chance of rain on sunday
• The fire doubled in size yesterday to 85 square miles (55,000 acres)
• It has crossed back over the gunflint trail. I assume this means crossing over gunflint lake based on previous reports
• The "head" is 2 miles wide moving south east towards poplar lake

There will be a community meeting at 10:00 with some long awaited maps since the blow up yesterday, I will update when I hear that info.

UPDATE 10:00 NEWS:
•Google map updated to reflect what I heard in in the news.
• Moved east into Canada then traveled south back over Gunflint, and across the Gunflint trail around HW 90 and Iron lake, and then further south.
• No new structures lost.
• "Tested yesterday, no one was hurt"
• Road block, no one goes past Poplar Lake firehall
• You can still get to E. Bearskin and such, but will be questioned.

UPDATE 10:10:
• No news structures lost (?) but things remain unclear
• Thank yous
• This is a unified type 1 command with Canada, county, state, and federal teams.
• Almost 500 people fighting the fire.
• All eastern BWCA access points are closed.
• Fire is unpredictable

UPDATE 10:15:
• 275 registered evacuees in Grand Marais
• This meeting will be re-broadcast at 2:00 on WTIP (web feed)
• New meeting around 7:00 tonight.

Morning info - Additional Cautionary Evacuation

From Boreal again, they have issued a "cautionary evacuation" of the Gunflint Trail down to swamper lake. This includes east bearskin. However. I believe that this is the same kind of evacuation order we received in 1995 during the Saganaga fire. Updated in the Google map

UPDATE: My dad will be there this morning unpacking our pump system along with our neighbors, making sure they are running, and then getting them cranking. I watched a piece from channel 11 news last night reporting from the line of the mandatory evacuation just before trail center, and it looked really spooky. The photo on the right is taken from that. All smoke and red sun, it looks as if the fire was right there. It's not of course, it is still miles away, but an eery sight none the less.

Star Trib article

Ok one more bit of info before bed and thankfully its good news. This article from the Star Tribune is stuffed with answers. In short:

• The expand evacuation was caused by the fire jumping from the north side of Gunflint lake to the South
• The prescribed burn "was a 100 percent success" in creating a buffer on the south flank of the fire. That's good to hear.
• The fire is now 47 square miles
• It has expanded significantly into Canada
• "Today we got our butt kicked"

I also want to say hello to all the friends and neighbors visiting here for the first time. I am happy I have this blog to keep every one updated, information is the best thing to have in this kind of situation! If you want to direct any one who wants info on the Ham Lake fire direct them to http://winnielovesus.blogspot.com/search/label/fire and they will get only fire related stories. Also, if you have information that I don't have please leave a comment below.

I hope to see all of you soon in places that are just as we left them!

Gunflint Trail closed to the public

From Boreal.org

"The Gunflint Trail is closed beyond the Greenwood Lake Road to all public traffic."

I assume this means non property owners. I have updated the Google map to reflect this.

Unofficial map

I have been looking all over for new maps and Megan came through with the goods - the raw satellite data based on heat. Here it is... Google map

UPDATE: Link to GEOMAC where I got my thermal info.

UPDATE 2: Here is a screen grab of what I am basing my map off of. As you can see its poor quality and I can't zoom in any more without the data disappearing for some reason, but its better than nothing.

Poplar Evacuation

Now the mandatory evacuation has expanded further to the Poplar lake ranger station, and I have updated the map accordingly. No news as to why this has happened or where the fire lines are now.

My mom spoke to my aunt who is up there, and she said that the back burn that jumped the lake went north with the winds and then the winds doubled back to come from the north, blowing flames across the lake. This is all third hand, but it fits into what I am hearing.

Scary stuff, the prime quote being "mother nature is in control"

UPDATE 9:20 Getting some good news from the central command, I found this published at 8:30 tonight on their web page:

In preparation of an expected wind shift, a burnout operation was conducted by firefighters late yesterday afternoon west of Gunflint Lake and north of Magnetic Road. This burnout was critical in fire suppression operations. Containment lines are holding. There remains a major concern for long-range spotting in and amongst structures on the south side of both Gunflint and Loon lakes. There has been some spotting, but no additional structures have been reported lost. An estimated 200 residences and over 20 commercial operations remain threatened.

Thats good news if its true. Who to believe?

Gunflint evacuation

The Gunflint trail after County Rd. 90 has been ordered to evacuate immediately. I have updated the Google map with this new information. No one is saying what this means, or what the fire has done, but needless to say it is not good. This evacuation covers Gunflint lake and Loon lake, two places we really care about and where we know people who live there.

UPDATE 6:35 PMAccording to the the Duluth News Trubune the reason for the sudden evacuation is the controlled burn that I was so positive before has now gotten out of control.

An intentional fire lit today near Magnetic Lake, which was supposed to head north, also headed east early today, into Canada and directly across Gunflint Lake from hundreds of people.

They are describing this as a "worst case" and I don't think they are too far off. I have also updated the map to show a better idea of the size of the controlled burn that is not so controlled.

Also, here is a photo my dad took of my friends Tom, John and my self heading right to where the fire is right now, in the summer of 2002. We are heading to a gap called the Gunflint narrows, and I bet that is where the fire jumped into Canada.

Quote of the day

From a second year on her way to a client simulation:

"I have to give fake bad news to a fake owner about his fake pet's fake disease."