Posted on 07/28/2002 10:14:13 AM PDT by Grampa Dave
Fires burning on more than 260,000 acres across Oregon
The Associated Press 7/28/02 1:04 AM
Major wildfires were burning on 264,000 acres in Oregon on Saturday. About 10,495 firefighters are working in the state. The Northwest Interagency Communication Center is tracking at least 14 major fires in Oregon. Top priorities for fire officials were the 9,000-acre Sheldon Ridge fire near The Dalles and the 2,261-acre Skunk Fire in Klamath County.
WHITE RIVER
Started: 7/23/02, one mile east of Maupin
Size: 20,000 acres
Containment: 30 percent.
Evacuations: mandatory evacuation of White River campground 7/24/02; Bake Oven Road and Buckhollow Road reopened, 7/27/02. Lower Deschutes River close from Shears Falls to Macks Canyon. 7/27/02.
Damage: Unknown.
On scene: 48 people
Cause: Lightning strikes
Threatened: 100 homes, 50 business, 200 outbuildings
SKUNK FIRE:
Started: 7/24/2002, Klamath County, north of Sprague River.
Size: 2,261 acres
Evacuations: Moccasin Hill and Klamath Forest Estates subdivisions
Damage: 50 homes, 5 business, 30 outbuildings threatened, one outbuilding destroyed.
Containment: 30 percent containment.
On scene: 360 people.
Cause: Lightning strikes.
SWAMP CREEK
Started 7/24/02, 4 miles northwest of Diamond.
Size: 320 acres.
Containment: 100 percent.
Evacuations: Threatened resources include Diamond Craters Research Natural Area, scattered outbuildings, ranches and livestock.
Damage: Unknown so far.
On scene: 48 people.
Cause: Lightning strikes.
CACHE MOUNTAIN:
Started: 7/24/02, 15 miles northwest of Sisters, Oregon
Size: 1200 acres.
Containment: 0 percent.
Evacuations: Camp Tamarack, mandatory evacuation. 7/25/02.
Damage: Fire has spread to Weyerhaeuser land. 7/25/02.
On scene: 62 firefighters.
Cause: Lightning.
SHELDON RIDGE:
Started: 7/24/02, 3 miles southwest of The Dalles.
Size: 9,000 acres
Containment: 30 percent
Evacuations: Voluntary evacuation of at least 250 homes.
Damage: Two outbuildings destroyed, one home damaged.
On scene: 800 firefigters, 125 Oregon National Guard troops.
Cause: Lightning.
WINTER-TOOLBOX FIRES
Started: in Lake County 07/12/02 and merged 7/20/02.
Size: 115,319 (both fires combined)
Containment: 55 percent (Toolbox); 55 percent (Winter)
Evacuations: Voluntary evacuations of 85 homes.
Damage: None reported.
On scene: 2,411 (both fires combined)
Cause: Lightning.
EYERLY COMPLEX
Started: 15 miles NE of Camp Sherman, 07/09/02.
Size: 23,573 acres.
Containment: 100 percent.
Evacuations: 280 homes asked to voluntarily evacuate last week.
Damage: 18 houses destroyed.
On scene: 949 firefighters.
Cause: Lightning.
MALHEUR COMPLEX
Started: 8-25 miles from Prairie City, 07/12/02.
Size: 15,500 acres.
Containment: 20 percent.
Evacuations: No mandatory evacuation, but 52 residences and 13 commercial properties and 196 outbuildings are threatened. A historic home, Austin House, is 4 miles from the fire.
Damage: None.
On scene: 1,088 firefighters
Cause: Lightning
TILLER COMPLEX
Started: Outside Tiller, east of Canyonville off Interstate 5, 07/12/02.
Size: 9,800 acres.
Containment: 18 percent
Evacuations: South Umpqua Road closed at milepost 6. Five homes in Ash Valley threatened. Tribal ceremonial grounds and critical cultural resources are threatened.
Damage: No listed damage.
On scene: 1,011 firefighters
Cause: Lightning.
NORTH UMPQUA COMPLEX
Started: 25 miles east of Glide, 07/12/02.
Size: 1,120 acres.
Containment: 35 percent.
Evacuations: 20 residences threatened, one business and 10 outbuildings. Historical resources, cultural sites threatened.
Damage: None.
On Scene: 561 firefighters.
Cause: Lightning.
MONUMENT FIRE
Started: 9 miles southwest of Unity, 07/12/02
Size: 24,400 acres
Containment: 60 percent.
Evacuations: 75 residences threatened, plus five commercial buildings and ten outbuildings.
Damage: Major power outages 7/25/02. Severe damage to computers and data management at fire camp.
On Scene: 1,495 firefighters, military battalion from Topeka, Kansas in place.
Cause: Lightning.
747/MURRAY COMPLEX
Started: Northeast of Paulina in Black Canyon Wilderness, 07/13/22.
Size: 11,739 acres
Containment: 50 percent.
Evacuations: No evacuations; Four homes and eight outbuildings threatened.
Damage: Road closures.
On scene: 906 firefighters.
Cause: Lightning.
BISCUIT-FLORENCE-SOUR BISCUIT COMPLEX
Started: 17 miles southwest of Cave Junction, 07/13/02.
Size: 15,930 acres
Containment: zero percent.
Evacuations: Threatened resources are 13 private residences, 36 outbuildings of Oak Flats. Fire jumped the Illinois River 7/25/02. Cloud cover on 7/26/02 prevented airborne attacks.
Damage: Five outbuildings destroyed.
On scene: 737 firefighters.
Cause: Lightning.
TIMBERED ROCK FIRE
Started: Unknown. 20 miles north of Medford.
Size: 4,100 acres
Containment: 10 percent
Evacuations: None
Damage: None
On Scene: 433 firefighters
Cause: lightning
----
Source: The Northwest Interagency Coordination Center
Treehuggers often nail tags to trees in Oregon that are printed with "I saved this tree".irony?
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.
Enviralists:
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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.
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.
"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.
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
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.
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