Fires burning on more than 260,000 acres across Oregon

Oregon Live/ AP ^ | 07/28/2002 | AP

[Grampa Dave]

When you read articles about the POS who set these fires and is in jail, it sounds like he did a minor prank.

May all of the fish wraps, magazines and periodicals who support these acts of eco terrorism suffer a few actions of similiar terror that costs them millions of $'s.

[Brad’s Gramma]

Thank you so much for taking the precious time to post this information.

It's all so sad. Such a pretty state..(all of them are!).

[Grampa Dave]

There was a Mexican Spotted Owl spotter/observer in the SW.

He was just arrested on multi arson charges to tie in with your remark re possible arson in these economically deprived areas to get a job fighting a fire.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for your kind words.

This is a burning issue with me. (Please pardon the terrible pun)

A personal goal for me the past couple of years is to wake up at least one conservative or moderate per week to realize how dangerous these eco fascists are to his/her family, he or she, his/her way of making a living and the right to decide where to live and work as an American.

The wonderful world of Free Republic enables me to reach that goal on a larger personal scale.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

Dave, here is a funny item:

Treehuggers often nail tags to trees in Oregon that are printed with "I saved this tree".

irony?

[Grampa Dave]

Here is an editorial from Brainstorm Magazine, a conservative magazine in Oregon. The editor addresses the failure tourism and the real end goals of the Eco Fascists re no logging on federal/state properties.

Editorial
Wobbly Pillars
Brainstorm.com

December, 2001

---

Last month Gov. Kitzhaber announced that, in response to our deepening economic crisis, efforts would be directed at increasing Oregon tourism. Given the state of Oregon's economy, far be it from us to throw cold water on any idea. But surely the governor has noticed that of all the industries hardest hit and undermined by terrorist activity, tourism probably tops the list. The airlines are in trouble and associated travel industries--restaurants, hotels, convention centers--are all feeling the pinch (make that a python squeeze).

If we're going to reinvigorate the economy, we might want to choose a less wobbly pillar upon which to rebuild.

Maybe we should even go back to comments from a former governor (Running on Empty, by Vic Atiyeh, Brainstorm, November 1999) who said, "if Oregon were to avoid such dramatic unemployment rates in the future, we would need to do more than just tighten the budget. We would have to have an economy with more than just two and a half pillars!the good news today is that Oregon has a diversified economy, an economy built around five solid pillars: high-tech, international trade, tourism, timber and agriculture.

Atiyeh's successful plans to reshape and strengthen Oregon?s economy have been virtually undone by the years of the Clinton/Kitzhaber administrations and the subsequent reliance on high-tech and the forced slowdowns in agriculture and timber.

About the same time that Kitzhaber was making his case last month for tourism to save Oregon from recession, the Sierra Club and 12 other preservationist groups announced an ill-timed campaign to halt logging of mature and old-growth trees in Oregon's federal forests.

The preservationists' campaigns are especially ill-timed because in Oregon's current economic crisis it will be absolutely necessary to carefully inventory and examine all of Oregon's resources for their most productive use and best practices.

According to Joe Keating of the Oregon Chapter of the Sierra Club, "all forests older than 80 years should be protected so that younger forests can develop into old growth."

Let's get this straight: we should protect existing old growth with the goal of all young trees turning into old growth. Sounds like the end game is to stop the cutting of all trees everywhere.

And Keating confirms the Sierra Club goal: The national position is the end of all commercial logging on federal lands. Just about half of Oregon is federally owned.

But federal forests aren't the only targets. Michael Scarpitti, better known as ledge-sitter "Tre Arrow," recently fell to the ground from his tree-sitting perch in the Tillamook Forest, where he and others from the loose-knit Cascadia Forest Alliance were singing a similar no-logging tune about state forests. Scarpitti quickly recovered from his injuries to return to the protests of the Acey Line thin in the Tillamook Forest. This protest isn't just ill-timed; it's also poorly aimed, because the Tillamook is the forest where all interested parties took more than six years to carefully design a sustainable harvest plan for the millions of trees planted by ordinary Oregonians after devastating forest fires left the area a near moonscape. For almost 50 years locals have been waiting to thin and harvest, and waiting to finally rescue their struggling local economies and schools.

Timber, ask any forest scientist, is a renewable resource. And fortunately we have hard data on the supply of this renewable resource. The graph below shows the available supply of timber over the past 50 years(1999-00 are unavailable, but reports show the current trends worsening). The graph tracks the volume of trees being grown (in million board feet) against the volume of timber being harvested. This is the kind of real data that forest scientists concerned about fire load have been discussing these past years. But now perhaps Oregonians might be ready to take a harder look at what this data portends for our economy in the coming years, not to mention fire protection.

Oregon?s forests are being under-harvested. They are becoming over-grown. It's really that simple. Oregon is one of the best places on the planet to grow timber. And the timber grows whether the Sierra Club fills its coffers with donations to save it or not.

Oregon taxpayers can spend money fighting the fires caused by overgrowth or they can earn money by harvesting the available timber.

Sustainable yields from Oregon forests, state, federal and private, are good for the forests and good for the Oregon economy.

The resource, the renewable resource, is all around us. Oregon State University and University of Washington forest scientists have developed some of the best tracking data and the best forest management practices in the world for using this resource without depleting it.

Fortunately, Frank Gladics, who gathered the data and built the graph shown here, was recently hired as a committee staffer for the Senate Natural Resources Committee in Washington D.C. Perhaps from his post there he can help restore some sanity and balance to Oregon's economy by advocating for wise use of our bountiful resources.

Tourism must be revitalized; high-tech will continue to rebound; international trade must be nurtured; but natural resources, timber and agriculture, are Oregon's greatest, most fundamental strength. To turn our back on this bounty is impractical and wasteful. Oregonians can afford to be neither.

[r9etb]

They used the clear cuts as the pyscho wedge to gain support of their zero logging agendas on the West Coast.

What's interesting to me is what appears to be a counter-effort by the USFS, along the lines of popularizing rational forest management. The demonstration thinning areas were in Camp Sherman, which I know to be visited by many among the Portland enviro sympathizers, and it was clearly aimed at them. The demonstration areas are very well marked with explanatory signs, public meetings, tours, and whatnot, and the results are clearly wonderful -- to look at, certainly, but also in terms of forest health.

I also saw numerous areas that had been cleared of vast stands of beetle- and moth-killed trees -- one of which is not too far from the Cache Mountain fire. That effort had been stalled for years. I have a feeling that this is mostly a result of there being a Republican administration, and I have to think Gail Norton's leadership has something to do with it, too.

The next step is for the local and national feds to realize that the residents of forest areas are usually devoted stewards of the lands, rather than enemies, which is how the Clinton-era USFS generally treated us.

[backhoe]

Dave, do you have one of these saved?

Enviralists:

To find all articles tagged or indexed using Enviralists, click below:
	click here >>>	Enviralists	<<< click here
(To view all FR Bump Lists, click here)

They are very easily adapted to any of the bump list groups-- you just change the "name" in 2 places, and alter the group number to suit.

[r9etb]

Oregon's forests are being under-harvested. They are becoming over-grown. It's really that simple. Oregon is one of the best places on the planet to grow timber. And the timber grows whether the Sierra Club fills its coffers with donations to save it or not.

Here is another area where the Metolius River serves as an excellent example. That area has been very heavily logged for many decades -- even as the very same area was a mecca for nature lovers. My mom's family has been going there since the 30s, and my dad's since the 'teens, and continuous logging had been going on the entire time. It was never an issue until clear-cutting and "eco-friendly" stuff started in the '70s or so.

The people who talk about preserving it have apparently never walked through the "old growth forests" in the area -- there are many big trees, certainly, but also many stumps, and a positive maze of old logging roads. Substantial logging even took place in the "unspoiled" areas bordering the west bank of the river. And yet even the logged areas weren't particularly ugly -- probably because they were never clear-cut, but instead selectively logged, so they returned to "natural-looking" after only a couple of years.

The lesson is, of course, that logging needn't destroy anything. And the fires and bug plagues of the past few years suggest that not logging leaves the forest open to far more destructive threats.

I think the real issue here is primarily psychological: the people filing suit seem genuinely to believe that it's possible to wish into existence a world where nothing dies, ever. To them, logging is murder, and making money -- especially on logging -- is worse than murder.

[joyce11111]

Yes, dsaahole has the right answer for a change.

[blackie]

Dave, thanks for staying on top of this...good job !!

Stop the attacks by the wacko, extreme left-wing, enviro-nazis terrorist's on our Freedoms !!

Freedom Is Worth Fighting For !!

Molon Labe !!

[blackie]

Powerful statement...most of the government owned 50% of Oregon is in the tree growing part of the state...

Stop the attacks by the wacko, extreme left-wing, enviro-nazis terrorist's on our Freedoms !!

Freedom Is Worth Fighting For !!

Molon Labe !!

[f.Christian]

bttt

[WaterDragon]

An acquaintence, very liberal, is bemoaning the fires because 'burned over forests are so ugly.' I told her that peoples' lives and property, their homes, are also threatened, some homes already destroyed. "Oh, yeah," she says. A transplant from out of state, and as self-absorbed as are all the liberals.

[AAABEST]

Sounds like the eco fascists end goals in Floriduh and Oregone are the same.

"Ore-gone". Heh.

Let me tell you Grampa, the Everglades is the excuse they use to systematically stomp the hell out of private property ownership here where I live. Some of the stuff that's going on here is really, really rotten. You have an idea of what I speak being that you live in socialist green California.

Create massive fire dangers by not allowing proper maintenance and then control the water in the areas.

I wish they just controlled the water. We now have 8 different types of soil that qualify property as a wetlands, along with the hundreds of species of plants and animals that could ruin your property rights.

They control the fire, water, air and earth for God's sake. I'm not going tinfoil either, they literally control all of it.

[eleni121]

Gee whiz...lots of lightning strikes most of all in Oregon. Is this just coincidence or what? Whatever is going on it is pretty sick stuff.

[dixiechick2000]

Thanks for the ping, the pics, and the updates, Gramps.
You have done yeoman's work on this issue!
Keep up the great work!;o)

[Salvation]

From katu.com in Portland

July 28, 2002

Black Butte Ranch Evacuated,
Flames Ravage Homes

SISTERS--
updated 6:23 p.m.

Firefighters ordered the evacuation of the 4,000-5,000 people in the Black Butte Ranch resort and subdivision Sunday afternoon after stiff winds from the northwest fanned the Cache Mountain Fire.

Initially the order was to evacuate only the Golf Homes section of the combination resort-residential subdivision, but Lisa Clark of the Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center said orders to evacuate everything quickly followed.

The winds were causing spot fires in and around the ranch.

The lightning-caused fire broke out on Wednesday and had burned about 3,300 acres by midday Sunday.

There were reports of one home burned in the resort, and ranch officials told KATU News they believe fire has reached about 4 homes. The ranch consists of a lodge, about 1,300 homes, golf courses, miles of bike trails, tennis courts and swimming pools. Many of the homes are vacation homes.

Black Butte general manager Loy Helmley said the evacuation was "very orderly."

"It's going to be a few days" before residents can return, he predicted.

The Red Cross was setting up evacuation centers.

Transportation officials closed Highway 20 between Santiam Junction and west of Sisters.

Meanwhile, the sprawling Sheldon Ridge wildfire near the Columbia River port town of The Dalles singed another 3,000 acres overnight, growing to 12,112 acres.

Some cabins in the area are believed to have been lost, according to the Oregon Department of Forestry, which reports that no actual homes have burned.

Mandatory evacuations are still in effect for residents of Mill Creek Rd. The evacuation advisory for residences along Brown Creek, Wells, Upper Cherry Heights and upper Vensel roads remains in effect.

An evacuation center has been set up at St. Peters Parish on West 10th and Cherry Heights Road.

The Sheldon Ridge fire is now 55% contained, said Peg Foster, an Oregon Department of Forestry information officer. According to the latest information KATU received, the fire was heading northeast.

"The fire is continuing to pose serious control problems," as gusty winds periodically kick up the flames, said Foster. She cited the danger of the smoke from the flames hitting electrical lines.

Residents of 250 homes have been urged to evacuate since the lightning-started fire flared Thursday and spread into subdivided rural land along three roads about three miles south of The Dalles.

Air tankers executed water drops on the southwest side of the mountain on Sunday. Structural teams are working to save homes as forecast conditions get hotter and drier with winds of 30 mph and upwards predicted.

The fire threatens at least 200 homes, 420 outbuildings and The Dalles Watershed.

Saturday night, the fire reportedly flared up at Brown Creek.

City workers abandoned a water treatment plant, taking chlorine and other potentially dangerous materials with them. About 60 homes were without water. Two outbuildings have burned.

Stiff winds whistling through the Columbia River Gorge pushed the fire toward high-tension Bonneville Power Administration electrical wires overnight, Foster said.

There are now 790 firefighters on scene which include 20 20-person crews, 66 engines, 10 dozers and 8 helicopters.

The wires were still live Sunday, but if carbon-rich smoke thickens around the cables, it could cause the electricity from the lines to arc, endangering firefighters. If that danger intensifies, she said, authorities might switch them off and reroute power.

Some of the blaze's growth Sunday was accounted for by more accurate mapping of the charred ground behind fire lines, rather than a single advance into new terrain, she said.

Four heavy lift choppers swooped and hovered over the fire, dipping underslung buckets into a pond below and then dumping the water to help quench the flames.

One helicopter pilot had to deal with more than fire Saturday afternoon, reporting that a person on the ground pointed a rifle at him as he hovered over a pond.

The Wasco County Sheriff's office arrested Rocky Wade Bratner, 47, on charges of menacing and pointing a gun.

"Probably the guy didn't want him to take any more water," Hinatsu said. The pilot got water from another pond.

Fire managers said their strategy Sunday was to contain the wildfire using 66 fire engines deployed mostly along Mill Creek Road. They hoped to slow its advance toward the electrical cables carrying power from Columbia River dams to Portland, and prevent its creeping down a hillside toward The Dalles. The town was not considered threatened.

A contingent of 125 Oregon National Guard troops arrived Saturday to help about 650 firefighters.

The fire mostly crept along the ground, burning grass and chaparral on the slopes without climbing into the crowns of oak and pine trees and leaping along the tops.

Janet Elliott watched from her porch as flames licked at scrub oak on a slope about a dozen yards behind her house. She said firefighters were doing a "wonderful" job and she didn't feel frightened. Elliott served cookies to the crew from Salem.

Some cows and horses were still caught in pastures behind the fire lines.

Rolland Taskey, 66, a retired aluminum worker, said he grabbed his two daschunds, Sassy and Simba, and a puppy named Chubb after a sheriff knocked on his door and told him to leave earlier this week. He and his wife, Delores, decided to leave four pet goats in a corral. The goats were not harmed.

"They told us to get out right away," he said.

Other Developments

In other developments, the Skunk Fire in Klamath County burned 2,400 acres about 17 miles southeast of Chiloquin, where it threatened two unincorporated subdivisions. The fire was 40 percent contained Sunday. The White River fire in Wasco County burned on about 25,000 acres. It was 50 percent contained.

The Timbered Rock fire burning 40 miles north of Medford is now threatening homes.

A total of 14 major fires, all started by lightning, were burning across 265,920 acres in Oregon, according to the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center. More than 11,529 firefighters battled the blazes.

On the web:
Sheldon Ridge fire transportation map

[Salvation]

I believe that it would be a prudent action if each Oregonian, Washingtonian, Arizonian, Californian, New Mexican, etc etc (you get my drift) would contact Senate Leader Duh-asshole. After all he is the expert when it comes to the ICC, Interstate Conflagation Committee. I'm sure he can explain to these crybabies why only South Dakota should be shielded from the envirowackos. The rest of the "madding crowd" must just grin and bear it as their homes and livliwoods go up in smoke!

You offer a sarcasm alert, but I am deadly serious. I think citizens (not the gov. reps.) from all the aforementioned states should file a class action lawsuit against Dashcle Dysfunction for disciminatory legislation.

And yes, we should be contacting his office to let him know that he has passed discrimanatory legislation. If he had been smart, he would have done it for all the 50 states and come out smelling like a rose.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Maybe we should pass that last idea to President Bush.

Sorry, Dysfunctional Dashcle, what's good for the goose is good for the gander.