Sanders County Ledger - Your Best Source For Sanders County News

Firefighters extinguished a fire at the Sanders County Refuse Site at Plains last week, as the light smell of the smoke drifted across the Clark Fork River, leading some to believe there was another wildfire.

A patron at the Plains Golf Course called in the fire to the dispatch center at Thompson Falls at 6:40 p.m. last Wednesday, said James Russell, fire chief at the Plains-Paradise Rural Fire District, which responded to the blaze with seven trucks. Firefighters from the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation and the U.S. Forest Service at Plains also had units on the fire.

Russell said the cause of the fire is unknown, but he said fires have started in debris at the dump in the past and are usually quickly put out. He said about two acres burned on this one. He said the fire was out by Sunday.