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KSL team coverageThe Corner Canyon fire has been burning for three days. It's almost out, and now the challenge is to find out who or what caused it. The fire is 35 percent contained, and firefighters expect full containment sometime tomorrow night.
Investigators know the fire is human-caused, and photographs from the public are leading them in a direction. The public has sent in at least 100 photographs of the fire, but investigators say the most valuable ones came from Jim Knable. He photographed the early moments of the fire, and that helped investigators pinpoint where it started.
"At first I was just headed northbound on I-15, and I immediately noticed a small area, no more than 30 feet in diameter, or less," Knable said.
He pulled over, called 911 and started snapping shots. "It just grew and grew, and it just swallowed the entire mountain, as you can tell," he said. "I think what the photos offer is more of a sequential time frame of how it started and how it grew. And maybe they can learn from that."
What investigators learned is that the fire started on the south side of Corner Canyon. Jason Curry, with the Utah Division of Forestry, said, "We look for a very small fire footprint of where it was just beginning. So we look for where that area is. And then we also analyze it, blow it up and enhance it to see if we can see any vehicles or any other human activity in the area."
Knable's photos do not show people or any vehicles, but investigators know that the south end of the canyon is a well-traveled area. They're also analyzing physical evidence from that origin and do have some theories on how the fire started, but they're not giving any details since this is still an open investigation.
According to the Bureau of Land Management, Utah has had four significant human-caused fires in the past three days. The BLM is concerned and believes the major culprit is sparks from vehicles or machinery.
Jason Curry, with the Division of Forestry, said, "Anybody that might have gotten a vehicle description: motorcycle, bicycle or motor vehicle. We're really depending on the public to step up and report anything they may have seen that was suspicious in the area."
All roads leading east into the incident area will remain closed. The Bonneville Shoreline Trail in the Draper area is closed to the public.
Meanwhile, the problems in the area won't go away when the fire is out. The flames have moved away from homes, but the charred earth they've left behind could be the next problem.
Steep slopes plus future rain could equal mudslides, which worries residents.
Vegetation is gone. As soon as the fire is out, state and local teams will try to come up with some preventive measures. Some ideas include reseeding natural vegetation or building trenches.
E-mail: gkennedy@ksl.com
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