A human-caused Summit County wildfire that ignited west of Echo Reservoir on Wednesday afternoon is threatening one home, an underground gas line and power lines.
The fire was first reported near Echo Junction at about 4:15 p.m. Wednesday and had grown to approximately 360 acres by Thursday, officials said. It is 0% contained.
In firefighting, “containment” refers to how much of a fire’s perimeter is secured, not how much of a fire is still burning. Dubbed the Dikker Hill Fire, its activity began to decrease overnight, though it scorched some oak brush pockets, officials said.
Brian Trick, a public information officer with the firefighting team, said officials had determined Thursday afternoon that a human caused the fire. Trick did not release additional details about how exactly it started.
Air and ground crews planned to spend the rest of the day Thursday setting up “anchors” — or points at which to start a fire line to prevent more spread, according to the Northern Utah Type 3 Incident Management Team, which took control of the response early Thursday.
Trick said light early Thursday rain had upped the humidity in the area, giving firefighters a better chance to wrangle the blaze.
While initial reports said the wildfire was threatening multiple structures, Trick said Thursday morning that just one house was threatened.
He added that the fire had taken out one power line, but it was not energized and didn’t result in any outages.
Trick also said that the fire likely wouldn’t disrupt the gas line in the area because it is buried 6 feet underground. That line is instead more at risk because of firefighter suppression efforts, like digging.
The fire has not impacted Interstate 80 traffic in the area.
