June is typically one of northern Minnesota’s wettest month, but that hasn’t proven to be the case so far this year— and that has helped elevate fire danger across virtually all of northern Minnesota. Indeed, high winds and warm temperatures this past weekend prompted the National Weather Service to issue a critical fire danger advisory on June 8.
No serious fires were reported over the weekend, although fire crews did extinguish an eight-acre wildfire near Gunsten Lake, located about two miles northeast of the junction of Hwy. 1 and Hwy. 2, in Lake County. That fire was reported by aerial reconnaissance.
Spring fire danger typically all but vanishes once the fields and forests green up in the North Country, but the lack of normal rainfall has kept fire dangers elevated well into June this year.