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Lightning sparks fire in Glenns Ferry area
A fire burning in the Walker Road area northwest of Glenns Ferry has burned more than 1,300 acres, already, the Bureau of Land Management estimated at mid-afternoon Thursday.
The fire, named the Alky Fire, jumped Walker Road at about 1:15 p.m.
BLM fire crews and air assets, along with members of the King Hill Rural Fire Department are battling the blaze, which was ignited by lightning from the storms currently passing through the area. The fire is about nine miles from Glenns Ferry.
A large column of smoke can be seen rising from the fire, which began about 11:25 a.m.
As of 2:30 p.m., the BLM had nine engines, two dozers, two helicopters and two air tankers on scene.
Containment was being hampered by highly erratic winds.
One travel trailer home in the area, owned by Jay Graham, was threatened by the fire, but a driveway around the structure, a firebreak that was enlarged by Graham using a drag hooked to his truck, helped divert the blaze around his home. A second, small trailer on his property was destroyed, however.
"I was pretty lucky, actually," he said.
Graham told a Mountain Home News reporter that he saw the lightning strike that started the fire
No further information on that fire was immediately available.
The BLM also has dispatched two engines to a one-acre fire burning two miles northeast of the Mountain Home Reservoir. Named the Rattles Fire, it began about noon.