SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - A fire Wednesday afternoon completely gutted an old trapper's cabin beside the Esso bulk gas plant, but Mother Nature lent a hand to keep it from becoming too dangerous.

"When we got to the scene, the cabin was pretty much already burned to the ground," said deputy fire chief Darcy Hernblad.

"We more or less just had to prevent the fire from spreading to neighbouring bush and trees. The fuel bulk plant wasn't at risk because the wind was blowing in the right direction."

He added there was little to no risk of an explosion at the plant at the end of Con Mine Road because of the fire, but there were concerns about the flames spreading through the trees which surrounded the building.

The fire happened around 3 p.m., and it took seven fire fighters a total of 19,000 litres of water to extinguish the blaze.

Hernblad said the fire is considered suspicious at this point in the investigation because of the lack of power in the unoccupied building. The main concern was getting the fire put out as quickly as possible, but he said in cases like this one, the flames tend to be somewhat relentless.

"The old logs that are used to build these cabins are tricky," he said. "When the fire gets in between them, it takes a while to suppress because of hot spots that develop. They are fires that even though they aren't challenging to put out, they are very stubborn to put out."

RCMP Const. Kathy Law said the fire is being investigated, but she was unable to provide any information at the time.

On May 27, another suspicious cabin fire happened overnight on Highway 3 about 10 km outside of Yellowknife. Whether the two fires are related is unknown.