Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines

A Summit County wildfire that sparked west of Echo Reservoir on Wednesday afternoon is threatening one home, an underground gas line and power lines.

The fire was first discovered near Echo Junction at about 4:15 p.m. Wednesday and had grown to approximately 250 acres by Thursday morning, 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 oakbrush pockets, officials said.

The Northern Utah Type 3 Incident Management Team took control of the response Thursday morning, and air and ground crews plan to spend the rest of the day setting up “anchors” — or points at which to start a fire line to prevent more spread.

Brian Trick, a public information officer with the firefighting team, said light early morning 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 more at risk because of firefighter suppression efforts, like digging, he said, than the blaze.

It’s not yet clear how the fire started. The fire has not impacted Interstate 80 traffic in the area.

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Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines

Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines

Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines

Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines

Summit County wildfire near Echo Reservoir threatens gas line, power lines