That is a headline you don’t see every day, but a backfiring snowmachine started a 261-acre wildfire Wednesday night north of Healy, Alaska. The owner was moving it into storage when it backfired and started a fire in the dry grass which was 4 to 6 inches tall. Firefighters from local fire departments, state forestry, smoke jumpers, and the Alaska Fire Service put it out, assisted by two air tankers, after it burned across a tundra moss layer and into some black spruce and hardwoods.
Generally, I guess, there is no need for snowmachines to have spark arrestors.
