BILLINGS (AP) -- Crews continued to fight a lighting-caused fire Tuesday that had burned nearly 5,000 acres on the Crow Indian Reservation, authorities said.
Another fire sparked by lightning on the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge north of Winnett grew to 1,200 acres Tuesday, while a third fire near Ennis was close to being contained.
Red flag fire conditions, a combination of hot weather, high winds and low humidity, were predicted across most of the state through Tuesday night, the National Weather Service said.
On the Crow Reservation, the Big Horn fire had burned about 4,800 acres of dry timber and tall grasses through Tuesday, said Pat McKelvey, fire information officer with the Northern Rockies Incident Management Team.
Winds had earlier posed a problem for firefighters by moving the fire into more timbered areas, but no structures were immediately threatened, officials said.
McKelvey said a 20-member Hot Shot crew was working the fire Tuesday and two more were expected Wednesday. Another three hand crews were on the lines. Equipment included three helicopters, nine engines, two dozers and five water tenders.
McKelvey said the fire was burning in such a remote area that ''the logistics are giving us as many problems as the fire itself.''
He said it's about a two-hour drive from the base camp to the fire area, and that firefighters are staged at a ''spike'' camp about two miles from the fire.
''Everything has to be hauled up there,'' McKelvey said. ''Water, port-a-potties, everything to support those crews. The road is so steep and rocky, it's just not suitable for the caterers.''
The McArthur fire on the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge, fueled by strong winds, blew up to about 1,200 acres by Tuesday night, said fire management officer Mike Granger. The fire had been had 450 acres Tuesday morning.
''We had a red flag warning today, and it definitely materialized _ strong winds, low humidity high temperatures,'' Granger said. ''Basically we pulled our crews off the lines because the conditions were too extreme.''
Crews were off the lines for about three hours as the fire spread.
''We dropped quite a bit of retardant on it,'' he said. ''We used helicopters on it, just nothing was working.''
The fire, which also burned onto some Bureau of Land Management and private land, was threatening an unoccupied, old ranch house, Granger said.
He said a Type II incident management team was being called in Wednesday morning, adding 35 specialized fire managers to the nearly 100 people already working the blaze.
Southwest of Ennis, crews continued to mop up the 125-acre Johnny Ridge fire, which was sparked by lightning on Saturday. Full containment was estimated by Thursday night, Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest spokesman Jack de Golia said.
