Posted on 08/07/2019 9:12:58 AM PDT by rintintin
DURANGO, Colo. — Cres Fleming got the call shortly after his neighbor spotted smoke. He jumped into a pickup that had been converted into a water tanker and plowed through waist-high weeds to the railroad tracks.
“It took two minutes and 24 seconds,” he said. “I timed it.”
When he reached the scene, flames were rushing up the hillside.
Fleming is a 74-year-old retired chemist, not a fireman. But he’s been dousing spot fires near his house for nearly two decades. This one was different.
His water hose was too short, the winds too high.
The June 1, 2018, fire went on to torch 54,000 acres, making it the sixth-largest wildfire in Colorado history. After the blaze was contained nearly two months later, heavy rains triggered floods in the burn areas, damaging homes and businesses.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Shut her down. If it can prevent one forest fire...........
Rip up the rails too! Eradicate that part of our past. Rewild the roadbed. After all, it’s only a memorial to the pillaging days of Colorado silver mining.
The people who moved into the forest surrounding the rails must have their needs come first!
This is like people moving near an airport and then working to shut it down.
This is a national treasure and a few trees are worth keeping it.
Forgive me for wondering if the leftist rails to bike trails freaks are involved in trying to shut down the railway and the local economy.
I’ve been to Durango a couple of times. It oozes with old west charm, lots of great shops and places to eat and the hot springs in winter can’t be beat. And seeing, feeling and hearing that locomotive chugging through town is priceless. The company maintains a couple of engines, tears one down every couple years and rebuilds it so there’s always one active locomotive in top condition. They have a complete maintenance facility, train station, museum, scads of employees who don period uniforms and provide the railroad experience as close to how it was as you can get. It would be a damn shame to see that railroad be persecuted out of business by the feds. GD feds; cut them a break and spend the resources on preventing future occurrences rather than destroying the town. It’s not like they run on donations, f’ng blind clod of a gov’t anyway.
Baloney. No structures burned in the fire...not one. There was some flash flooding later....in the wettest year Colorado has had in decades.
This is grifters in trophy houses and attorneys looking for a handout. And the lawsuits are not simply repairing any damage that was truly caused by the 416 fire. But they are also suing for the total cost of the firefighting effort... as defined by Fedzilla.
We waste more money than that in tranny conversion and homo studies in the Navy.
The rail line is a national treasure. Their house bordering the forest isn’t. And they are the ones who built in potential flood zones.
I had not even thought of that. That probably is a very real part of this. They would love to kill that train.
BTW, it has never even been officially proven by the USFS that the train caused it. It is simply their most likely hypothesis.
There have been trains running on these tracks for over 100 years, dry weather is a common occurrence in this part of the country. I imagine they had the same problems then, yet no one wanted to put the railroad out of business. The problem is too many Californians up there.
It needs to be tried right downtown in the county courthouse. NO change of venue. And no out of state drivers license holders in the pool.
I think I read somewhere a local history professor suggesting some elite types (newcomers?) don’t like the train and want it gone
I was a volunteer firefighter years ago. We had a bunch of fires along the railroad tracks that were caused by a broken wheel on one of the freight cars.
Good posting
I like Durango
That French bakery Jean Pierre on Main I stop every time even if only passing through
I first hit Durango in 1975 after climbing or hiking in the San Juans near Uncompaghre
I drove a Honda Civic with three long hairs in it and gear stowed on top across shelf roads from lake city to silverton...locals said I was crazy....
I wasn’t I was just stoned
I tend to be in that area annually now for the shelf roads and Jeep trails
In my FJ or Wrangler
The train is a treasure needing to be preserved
Man Colorado in the 60s and early 70s was perfect....a cowboy state still
A few hippies in Boulder
Most still stayed down in Santa Fe and Taos
Boy the worm sure turned
If I lived there I’d be western slope for sure now
Rkman,
Go to Chama.
It is the economy.
Shut it down?
Ok pal
wonder if was a cig butt - usually that’s the cause for roadside brush fires.
The same federal gub mint that’EPA poisoned the Animas River that runs through it?
Jet Engine? Crater? Sell the metal and build an in-ground pool! Jet Engine - direct causation. distant analogy.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.