Lichen Fire at Mile 92 Fully Contained

The Lichen Fire near Mile 92 of the Parks Highway is now one hundred percent contained, according to the incident commander.

The fire was initially reported on Sunday evening shortly before 7:00 pm.  Firefighters from five Mat-Su departments as well as the Alaska Division of Forestry responded.  Forestry Public Information Officer Kale Casey says the speed and scale of the response kept the fire from growing.

“It was a very quick response by all the local fire departments, by Mat-Su helitack, and by the Mat-Su Initial Attack squad of six.  And they really started digging fire line as soon as they could while the helicopter worked the head of the fire, and that got the head of the fire knocked down….”

Casey says the initial attack efforts allowed air tankers with retardant to come in and further prevent the fire’s spread.

Area fire departments that responded included Caswell, Willow, Talkeetna, Houston, and Central.

The fire claimed a single structure, and some nearby properties were evacuated Sunday evening.  By late Sunday night, firefighters had the fire surrounded and were beginning mop-up work.

Casey says the cause of the fire is still under investigation.

“The fire is under investigation, and we’ll get a report on that, here, whenever that timeframe is.  Usually it takes awhile to figure out the point of origin and how things started, but we do know there’s been a lot of firework activity in the area….”

The Lichen Fire grew to around two-and-a-half acres in total.