Happy Birthday Cavity Lake Fire

One week ago today the Cavity Lake Fire began, no one is celebrating it’s arrival.  The Type I Team is however happy and confident in their ability to keep the fire from jumping over the prescribed burn areas and into the residential areas around the Gunflint Trail.  We can all breathe a sigh of relief.  The Eastern perimeter is pretty well secured and crews will continue to monitor and mop up any areas along that edge as needed.  The threat of the fire reaching Voyageur and the Gunflint Trail has lessened and now instead of worrying about our lives we are worrying about our livelihood.  As an outfitter we put groups into the Boundary Waters throughout the Summer and our busiest time of the year tends to be the last week of July and the first week of August.  Some outfitters do 20-50% of their business during this peak time so the implications of the fire could be bad.  The USFS has canceled permits to enter into Seagull, Missing Link, Brandt Lake, Cross Bay, and the Kek Trail until August 5th.  Since the availability of other permits is scarce some people will not be able to take their BWCA camping trip this year. Then there are others who have permits in areas completely unaffected by the fire yet choose to cancel due to the media frenzy around the fire.  There are even more guests who will worry about their trip scheduled for September or even next year who will make alternate plans because of their uncertainty.  The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and Quetico Park are over a million acres in size and the Cavity Lake Fire is 28,500 acres; this is a relatively small area of the wilderness in the grand scheme of things.  There is plenty of area left for canoeing, camping and enjoying this wonderful wilderness from the end of the Gunflint Trail.

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