Wildland Fire Management has nearly contained the 41-hectare fire burning nine kilometres southeast of Faro.
“The fire is not out yet, but it hasn’t grown in size and it hasn’t moved any closer to the community - so that’s obviously good news,” said fire information officer George Maratos.
As of Thursday afternoon, 25 firefighters were working on site to contain the blaze, along with two helicopters.
At that point, 80 per cent of the fire was contained.
Containment involves extinguishing the fire on the perimeter and removing fuel so that the fire doesn’t spread.
“We’re working our way around it and with any luck we’ll have it encircled in the next 24 hours,” said Dave Milne, the Yukon duty officer.
Once the fire is contained, crews will work to extinguish the fire completely, which could take anywhere from several days to two weeks.
The wildfire was believed to have been caused by lightning.
“It’s a pretty large fire and it could become active again depending on the weather,” said Maratos.
“The winds are forecasted to remain low, but there’s also some very warm weather coming over the next week.”
The late spring experienced in the territory helped contain the fire from spreading too quickly.
“If something like this were to happen in July then it could be a different situation,” said Maratos.
“It’s not a risk at this point, but any time there’s a community close by it becomes a top priority.”
Two small human-caused fires were reported and extinguished on Wednesday.
One was on Christmas Creek along the Alaska Highway after a cabin caught fire.
The second was near Free Gold Mountain, near a mining camp 50 kilometres northwest of Carmacks.
In total, there have been five fires in the territory this year, burning approximately 42 hectares of forest.
Contact Chris Oke at
chriso@yukon-news.com