Only God Could Stop The 1981 Wilson Camp Lightning Fire Across The Copper River

As Canada Burns In July, 2026, Remembering When The Copper Valley Was Ablaze  

 FROM THE JOURNAL ARCHIVES 

COPPER RIVER HISTORY 
The Wilson Camp Lightning Fire Of 1981 Could Only Be Stopped By Nature 

Copper Valley Forest Fire (Photo, Tazlina Forestry) 

 

The first Copper River Country Journal was published in 1986. Five years earlier, a major fire had stricken Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, across the Copper River. We had not started our newspaper at the time, but the fire was devastating. 

So we wrote a story about that fire, and in the public interest we xeroxed the story on sheets of paper and distributed it at post offices and public locations throughout the region.  In 1989, we reprinted the original tale in the Country Journal. 

THE WILSON CAMP LIGHTNING FIRE

EVEN THE COPPER RIVER COULDN'T STOP IT 

______________________________

Copyright © Copper River Country Journal, 1981-2021