Posted on 07/26/2002 6:24:57 AM PDT by Grampa Dave
Flames force evacuations in The Dalles (East of Portland, Oregon)
By JEFF BARNARD The Associated Press
SPRAGUE RIVER, Ore. (AP) -- Oregon's wildfire season took a turn to the north late Thursday when the Sheldon Ridge Fire grew to 3,000 acres and forced 200 homes near The Dalles to be evacuated.
The fire was reportedly a few miles southwest of the city and threatening expensive homes in the nearby hills.
City firefighters from Portland were sent to the area by mandate of the Conflagration Act, which allows the governor to ask for assistance of local firefighters when wildfire resources get low, said Jocelyn Biro, spokeswoman for the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center.
Though the firefighters work in the city, they are also trained to fight wildfires, said Neil Heesacker, spokesman for the Portland Fire Bureau.
Earlier Thursday, a special investigation team went to Oregon's biggest wildfire to find out why 20 firefighters had to climb into their emergency shelters to escape flames.
There didn't appear to be any breakdown in procedures or communications that would account for firefighters resorting to what is generally considered a last-ditch survival tactic, but the investigation was a standard step after emergency shelters are deployed, said Marc Rounsaville, deputy area commander for the U.S. Forest Service.
"We want to get right on top of it so if we do need to make some adjustments we can do that," Rounsaville said.
Flames overran a Willamette Valley crew known as Ferguson 53 on Wednesday afternoon while they were fighting spot fires on the northern edge of the Winter Fire just off Oregon Highway 31 near Picture Rock Pass between Silver Lake and Summer Lake. Eleven firefighters were treated for minor burns and smoke inhalation and released from St. Charles Medical Center here.
They returned to fire camp in Silver Lake on Thursday, where the entire crew was going through crisis debriefing, said Rounsaville.
There was no word on when they would return to work on the Tool Box and Winter fires, which have burned together to cover more than 108,000 acres of sagebrush and timber on the Fremont National Forest between the south central Oregon communities of Silver Lake and Summer Lake.
Later the fire jumped the highway and threatened some homes near the community of Summer Lake, but firefighters stopped the advance, Rounsaville said.
The six-person investigation team includes personnel from the Forest Service's Technology Development Center in Missoula, Mont., which oversees improvements to fire shelters, Rounsaville said.
The firefighters were putting out spot fires along a logging road and had just been checked by a division supervisor when the fire made a run at them from the north side, he said.
They shook out their shelters, which look like a pup tent made of silvery foil, and climbed inside, laying face down on bare dirt in the fire line. They moved their shelters two or three times as flames jumped back and forth across the line, but were not in the shelters long before a supervisor told them it was safe to come out, Rounsaville said.
About 10 minutes later, a helicopter making bucket drops lost power and made an emergency landing on the other side of the fire line, Rounsaville said. The pilot walked away unhurt, but the helicopter, a UH-1H, remained on the ground, a fire line cut around it for protection.
A total of 16 major fires, all started by lightning, were burning across 220,000 acres of Oregon, according to the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center.
In Klamath County, the Skunk Fire quickly grew to 1,600 acres about 17 miles southeast of Chiloquin, threatening 25 homes, five businesses and 30 outbuildings in a subdivision of the tiny town of Sprague River, said Kathy Fletcher, spokeswoman for the Klamath Falls Interagency Fire Coordination Center.
A voluntary evacuation order had been issued to Klamath Falls Estates, a 100-home, unincorporated subdivision of mobile homes, cabins and vacation homes, said Klamath County Sheriff Tim Evinger.
Twenty-seven people had decided to leave and were staying at the Sprague River Community Center, said Donna Upson, director of the Klamath/Lake chapter of the Red Cross.
Outside a local market, Roy and Tammy Miller, who fled their trailer Wednesday night, sat in their pickup and talked to neighbors.
"Everybody is checking with me because I'm the farthest one up the mountain," said Roy Miller, a painting contractor. "If I'm safe, everybody is safe."
The drive up the coast is great! Scenic ect. there are also lots of interesting places to stop and tour along the way.
EBUCK
Yup. There's no saving it now because USFS personel have been totally brainwashed by government universities. "Leave it to the professionals to do their jobs" would be a disastrous policy.
Freedom Is Worth Fighting For !!
Molon Labe !!
The air IS smokey as all get-out, but other than that, everything's fine...
Ed
Hope you guys are all doing OK up there: we get some pretty nasty fires down here, too, but you've really been hit hard this year.
Ed
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