Holloway fire closes public lands in Oregon
DENIO, Nev. - The Holloway fire has burned over 400 square miles of high desert along the Oregon and Nevada border, prompting the Bureau of Land Management to close some areas in Oregon, fire officials said Saturday.
The fire has been relatively quiet to the south and west flanks, but has grown in the north reaching Whitehorse Creek in Oregon. BLM closed the public lands west of Highway 95 between Whitehorse Road and the Nevada state line to prevent hunters from getting trapped by the Holloway fire.
The fire has burned nearly 260,000 acres since it was sparked by lightning last Sunday. The fire was helped by triple-digit temperatures, single-digit humidity and gusty winds to scorch mile after mile of Great Basin sagebrush steppe.
Holloway's incident commander, Chris Ourada, said that firefighters are reporting dozens of 'fingers' of flames to the north, rather than a solid wall of fire.
"It may have grown about 40,000 acres in the last 24 hours, but it didn't double in size." Ourada said in a press release Saturday afternoon.
Fire behavior experts report conditions that have allowed the fire to actively burn over new terrain 20 hours per day, giving the more than 550 firefighters working the blaze little time to contain the blaze. The rugged terrain has also restricted crews to fighting the fire on foot and by air.
The fire is listed as 30 percent contained on Saturday, and weather forecasts contain more dry lightning and wind gusts up to 30 mph from the northeast Saturday night.
