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ANCHORAGE,
Alaska (AP) -- Firefighters are monitoring a rare 20,000-acre
blaze on frozen tundra near the village of Kotlik on the
southern coast of Norton Sound.
Alaska's
wildfire season is usually over by December.
"I
haven't heard of anything like it," said Andy Williams,
spokesman for the Alaska Interagency Coordination Center.
The
fire in southwest Alaska is within the Yukon Delta National
Wildlife Refuge managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Larry
Vanderlinden, fire management coordinator for the agency,
said fire crews would be brought in only if residents or
structures are threatened by the blaze, which was first
spotted Wednesday.
Fighting
the fire would be dangerous because of the elements and
the speed with which the blaze is moving, spreading at least
13 miles by Friday, he said.
"We
couldn't really expect people to camp out there," Vanderlinden
said. "Natural resources are not worth putting human
life at risk."
Both
the Pastolik and the Pastoliak rivers, as well as smaller
streams and lakes, stand between the village and the fire.
The
cause of the fire was under investigation.
"The
most reliable information is that it was started by the
backfire of a snowmachine," Vanderlinden said.
The
area is mostly snow-free.
People
use the refuge on snowmobiles even without snow. Tides raise
levels of major rivers and flood mud flats. The flooded
areas freeze and leave paths for snowmobiles on ice, Vanderlinden
said.
The
area is designated for full fire protection because of concerns
for critical wildlife habit. However, the threatened wildlife,
such as the bristle-thighed curlew, is not around this time
of year.
"The
threat to those birds is in the summer time when they're
nesting," Vanderlinden said.
The
refuge covers 19.6 million acres and encompasses the deltas
of the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers, the two longest rivers
in Alaska.
The
region is treeless and consists mostly of vast tracts of
wetlands.
According
to the Fish and Wildlife Service, the refuge provides habitat
for more than 750,000 swans and geese, 2 million ducks,
and 100 million shore and water birds. Moose, caribou, grizzly
bear, black bear, and wolves inhabit the northern hills
and eastern mountains of the refuge.
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