Rabbit Foot Fire grows to 34,500 acres, still no end in sight

CHALLIS — A thunderstorm passing over the Salmon-Challis National Forest produced several new ignitions near the Rabbit Foot Fire Friday.

The ever-growing forest and grass fire, located about 22 miles north of Challis, was measuring at 34,512 acres as of Saturday morning.

Despite some rain on Friday, the fire is not showing any signs of slowing down or stopping.

There are now 694 firefighter manning the fire lines and the blaze is still zero percent contained. It’s now been burning for 16 days.

On Friday, firefighters continued improving dozer lines and roads near the fire perimeter in preparation of the fire reaching them, where firefighters will have safer and more opportunities to directly suppress it, according to a news release. Burnouts on the interior of some of the lines may be initiated to strengthen them if weather conditions allow. A total 30 miles of existing roads have been improved using mechanized equipment and 20 miles of old dozer lines from previous fires have been reopened.

Additionally, helicopters have dropped a total of 433,479 gallons of water on the fire to slow its growth.

Weather this weekend appears to be favoring firefighters. It’ll be cloudy with possible rain showers, higher humidity of 24 to 30 percent, and light winds of only 5 to 10 mph.

A number of rural roads and trails remain closed in the area. For a comprehensive list click here.