Fourth Utah Task Force Deploys To Help With Massive Dixie Fire
Aug 9, 2021, 2:04 PM | Updated: May 21, 2023, 4:46 pm
The Greenville Library is surrounded by rubble as the Dixie Fire continues to burn on August 6, 2021 in Greenville, California. (Photo by Trevor Bexon/Getty Images)
(Photo by Trevor Bexon/Getty Images)
WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah — Almost two dozen Utah firefighters have been deployed to help battle the Dixie Fire, which has become the largest single fire in California history and burned an area more than twice the size of New York City.
Twenty-two firefighters, five engines and support vehicles left the Maverik Center Monday morning, becoming the fourth Utah task force deployed under the Emergency Management Assistance Compact to help fight fires across the West.
The current Task Force No. 2 is composed of crews from the Unified Fire Authority, Wasatch County Sheriff’s Office and Provo, Draper, Cedar City, Murray, Orem and West Valley City fire departments.
The current Task Force No. 1, which deployed Thursday, is in Montana to fight wildfires there while task forces Nos. 3 and 4 returned Sunday from fighting wildfires in Montana.
The task force will deploy for 16 days — 14 working days plus two travel days.
Dixie Fire
The massive Dixie Fire has burned almost 500,000 acres — an area larger than both Davis (405,760 acres) and Weber (421,760 acres) counties.
Fueled by powerful gusts and bone-dry vegetation, the fire incinerated much of the small community of Greenville last Wednesday and Thursday. At least 627 homes and other structures had been destroyed by Monday and another 14,000 buildings were still threatened in the northern Sierra Nevada.
Smoke from the Dixie Fire, along with other large wildfires across the West Coast, has covered the Wasatch Front with smoke. For a brief period Friday, when the smoke rolled into the Salt Lake Valley, Salt Lake City had some of the world’s worst air quality.
