Members of the Saranac Lake and Lake Placid volunteer fire departments prepare to head out to Lower Saranac Lake to fight a fire caused by an unattended campfire on Monday afternoon. (Provided photo — Andy Walkow)

SARANAC LAKE — An unattended campfire burned a 200-by-100-foot area of Norway Point on Lower Saranac Lake Monday afternoon, before Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department firefighters boated in to put out the wildland blaze.

SLVFD Chief Michael Knapp said somebody used a fire pit there to cook a meal with charcoal. But they left without extinguishing the fire and it spread outside of the pit, catching the woods on fire.

“Make sure that your fires are properly extinguished,” he said.

Forest rangers with the state Department of Environmental Conservation are investigating the fire. Knapp said the people who started it were not at the scene of the blaze.

This is the third time an unattended campfire has started a wildland fire this summer alone, Knapp said. SLVFD also put out a fire on an island on Middle Saranac Lake earlier this summer, and DEC rangers handled one at a walk-in camp site off state Route 3.

The Saranac Lake Islands Campground and Day Use Area has seen several human-caused fires recently.

Last year, on Aug. 27, a 50-by-200-foot wildfire started by an out-of-control gasoline-fueled campfire burned around 4% of Goose Island, which is around one-third of a mile from Norway Point.

A local on the lake texted Knapp a GPS pin where the fire was as they put in at the Second Pond boat launch. As soon as they came out of the channel from First Pond, they could see the smoke, he said.

SLVFD responded with 15 members, two trucks and two boats. The Lake Placid Volunteer Fire Department responded with a brush truck and six members.

Knapp said it took multiple portable pumps and hand tools to knock the fire down and establish a fire line.