CUSTER STATE PARK, S.D. (KELO.com) -- The fight against the big wild fire that has closed Custer State Park went into high gear on Tuesday.
The Park's Kobee Stalder says that until now the challenging terrain around the Legion Lake Fire kept firefighters from directly battling the blaze. That's why it has not yet been contained.
"A lot of our two track roads go into canyons and, you know, we don't like to put firefighters in canyons...and you can't put them on top of the ridges when fire's coming up at them,"
But Stalder now says a strategy has been worked out to fight the fire directly through 'burn outs' - strategic burns to deny the wild fire the fuel to expand.
Until the direct firefighting strategy was developed, firefighters were concentrating on protecting buildings in the park, especially the State Game Lodge and Blue Bell Lodge.
"We can tip our hats and thank our firefighters that we haven't lost any of these buildings ...and I'm very confident to say that we are not going to lose any of these buildings."
As of Tuesday morning, at least 3,000 acres had been burned and the fire was zero percent contained, but again, Stalder says that containment will start to go up now that firefighters will be directly battling the blaze.