NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
Page 2A
Tuesday, November 27, 2018
Firefighting crew has common trait: military service
By ANDREW SELSKY
Associated Press
SALEM — After being
in firefights in Afghanistan
and Iraq, members of one
of America’s newest elite
wildfire crews are tasked
with fighting fires in rugged
country back home.
On the U.S. Bureau of
Land Management’s only
hotshot crew focused on
recruiting veterans, mem-
bers have traded assault
rifles and other weapons
of war for chain saws and
shovels. But, like in the mil-
itary, they have camaraderie,
structure and chain of com-
mand. And the occasional
adrenaline rush.
“Being in a firefight is
way different than being
in a wildland fire, but both
are mentally taxing,” said
Chris Schott, who served
two tours in Afghanistan
with the Army’s 7th Special
Forces Group. “In a wild-
land fire, no one’s shooting
at you, but conditions can
go favorable to unfavorable
very quickly.”
The Lakeview Veterans
Interagency Hotshot Crew,
based in Klamath Falls,
received its hotshot certifi-
cation after rigorous train-
ing and testing, the Bureau
of
Land
Management
Kari Greer/BLM/USDA Forest Service via AP
A member of a fire crew out of Lakeview works on the Cougar Creek Fire in central
Washington state on Aug. 17.
announced last week. It’s
now among 112 elite U.S.
wildland firefighting teams
and the only targeting vet-
erans for recruitment, the
agency said.
Crew
superintendent
Michael McGirr said he
and other managers took
then-President
Barack
Obama’s initiative to hire
veterans to heart.
“We felt it was important
for them to transition back
home,” McGirr said.
Their maturity and ability
to follow and lead are ben-
efits that quickly became
apparent when the crew
started operating in 2012 as
a lower-classification unit,
McGirr said. Their mili-
tary experience also means
they’re used to enduring
tough missions.
“It’s a lot of arduous
hiking in nasty terrain,”
McGirr said. “The steeper
the terrain, that’s usually the
ground hotshots are on.”
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
Mostly cloudy with
a little rain
Rather cloudy
A touch of
afternoon rain
Rain and drizzle in
the morning
Snow, sleet mixed
in early
53° 42°
52° 36°
55° 42°
54° 35°
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
43° 34°
48° 35°
45° 38°
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
46° 37°
51° 37°
47° 40°
OREGON FORECAST
ALMANAC
Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows.
PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Seattle
Olympia
56/45
45/39
50/29
Longview
Kennewick Walla Walla
52/43
Lewiston
57/47
55/43
Astoria
56/45
Pullman
Yakima 48/35
55/43
49/39
Portland
Hermiston
57/47
The Dalles 55/42
Salem
Corvallis
56/45
Yesterday
Normals
Records
La Grande
43/36
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
Bend
57/45
51/35
47/38
Ontario
40/32
Caldwell
Burns
42°
30°
45°
31°
67° (1933) 4° (1993)
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
Albany
57/46
0.00"
0.27"
1.02"
6.72"
8.67"
8.30"
WINDS (in mph)
43/32
44/24
Trace
0.39"
1.25"
8.54"
15.17"
11.24"
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Pendleton 44/34
57/47
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
HERMISTON
Enterprise
53/42
51/40
36°
27°
44°
30°
71° (1892) 1° (1993)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
56/43
Aberdeen
44/37
44/33
Tacoma
Yesterday
Normals
Records
Spokane
Wenatchee
57/47
Today
Boardman
Pendleton
Medford
54/40
Wed.
SW 4-8
SSW 7-14
WSW 4-8
WSW 6-12
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
48/31
Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2018
Sunrise today
Sunset tonight
Moonrise today
Moonset today
7:10 a.m.
4:15 p.m.
9:08 p.m.
11:28 a.m.
Last
New
First
Full
Nov 29
Dec 6
Dec 15
Dec 22
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 88° in Immokalee, Fla. Low -12° in Gunnison, Colo.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
Shown are noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day.
-10s
-0s
0s
showers t-storms
10s
rain
20s
flurries
30s
snow
40s
ice
50s
cold front
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60s
70s
80s
90s
100s
warm front stationary front
high
110s
low
Kenn Boles, a member
of the crew since 2012 who
did three tours in Iraq as a
Marine, agreed that veterans
can withstand the intense
work.
“You’re working hard,
sweating; the fire doesn’t
stop because of those
things,” he said. “It’s like
in combat — just because
you’re hungry, tired and
thirsty doesn’t mean the fire-
fight stops.”
The crew is on leave
erans to share their war-
time experiences with those
who understand what they
endured.
Boles lost a close friend a
week after he left Iraq. That
was the biggest contributor
to post-traumatic stress dis-
order that hit him later, he
said, describing it as “a lot of
survivor’s guilt.” The veter-
ans have each other’s backs
when PTSD issues arise,
acting as a support group.
“Instead of bottling it
up, we’re really receptive to
hearing people’s stories and
problems,” said Boles, who
was in the invasion of Iraq
and in heavy fighting in Fal-
lujah and Ramadi.
Schott, who served in
Afghanistan’s
Urozgan
Province north of Kanda-
har, said, “A lot of times
you think, this can’t get any
worse. And yet you made it
through.”
He was in an operations
center when he heard radio
traffic about someone killed
in action. It was his best
friend.
“Myself, I was in denial
for quite a long time about
my PTSD,” Schott said,
adding that joining the crew
and opening up to other vet-
erans “helped me get my life
back on track and where it
needs to be.”
Oregon abortion laws bring
in out-of-state residents
By MARKIAN HAWRYLUK
The Bulletin
BEND — Oregon is pro-
viding more abortions than
its residents receive, a sign
the state’s abortion laws are
less restrictive than in some
neighboring states.
According to data released
by the federal Centers for
Disease Control and Preven-
tion last week, Oregon resi-
dents underwent 7,847 abor-
tion procedures in 2015, out
of a total of 8,610 abortions
performed within the state —
about 11.2 percent of abor-
tions in Oregon were for out-
of-state residents.
For comparison, in Idaho,
fewer abortions (1,272) were
performed than residents
received (1,695), with just
4.6 percent for out-of-state
residents. Washington had
nearly the same number of
total abortions and abortions
for residents.
“We tend to assume that
because abortion is legal that
everybody has readily avail-
able access to the procedure
when needed,” said Grayson
Dempsey, executive director
for NARAL Pro-Choice Ore-
gon. “The reality is that for
women who are in a state like
Idaho, they are often needing
to cross state lines or get to
urban centers to get the care
they need.”
According to the Gut-
tmacher Institute, which
tracks abortion policy from
state to state, Idaho has a
number of restrictions in
place that make it harder for
women to access abortions.
Those include state-directed
counseling designed to dis-
courage women from having
abortions, a 24-hour waiting
period and, for minors, con-
sent of a parent.
Oregon has none of those
restrictions.
In some cases, women
living near the Oregon bor-
der may find it closer or more
convenient to drive across
state lines. That occurs in the
Ashland area with women
from Northern California.
The CDC did not provide data
from California in the report.
Dempsey said a number
of women fly from Alaska
to Portland or Seattle to seek
abortions.
In other cases, women
may cross into Oregon to get
certain types of abortions not
available where they live.
Women in Vancouver, Wash-
ington, can get abortions
from a local Planned Parent-
hood clinic. They must travel
to a clinic in Portland if they
need a second-trimester abor-
tion, which are not offered at
the Vancouver clinic.
Oregon is one of only a
handful of states that allow
nurse practitioners to per-
form abortions. In 2006, the
Oregon board of nursing was
the first in the country to rule
that aspiration abortion was
within the scope of practice
for family nurse practitioners.
“It’s really increased
access in small and rural com-
munities,” Dempsey said.
“That is a huge way in which
Oregon is not only progres-
sive in its legislative commit-
ment to reproductive rights
but really furthering access
for women in ways that have
a really practical impact on
women needing services.”
Crabbers sue fossil fuel companies
SALEM (AP) — Com-
mercial crabbers in Oregon
and California are suing 30
fossil fuel companies, claim-
ing they are to blame for cli-
mate change, which has hurt
their industry.
The Pacific Coast Fed-
eration of Fishermen’s
Associations filed the law-
suit last week in California
State Superior Court in San
Francisco against compa-
nies including Chevron and
Exxon Mobil, news outlets
reported.
“The scientific linkage
between the combustion of
fossil fuels and ocean warm-
ing, which leads to domoic
acid impacts in our fisher-
ies, is clear,” Noah Oppen-
heim, executive director of
the Pacific Coast Federa-
tion of Fishermen’s Associa-
tions, told the San Francisco
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and hasn’t been battling the
recent deadly wildfires in
California.
Of the 25 positions on the
crew, 17 are filled by veter-
ans, McGirr said. There are
three additional openings,
and McGirr said he wants to
recruit female veterans, too.
Schott, the Army veteran,
said the crew felt they had
the potential to achieve elite
hotshot status after fight-
ing fires in 2015, includ-
ing one in Oregon’s Cra-
ter Lake National Park that
they almost had contained
when winds picked up and
changed direction, pushing
the flames behind them.
They worked two weeks
in a row, digging fire lines
and doing prescribed burns
to deprive the fire of fuel.
After three days off, they
worked another two weeks
straight.
“After that, we thought
we could be the first vet-
erans hotshot crew in the
nation,” Schott said.
The crew usually works
for nine months, with three
months off.
“We spend more time
together than with our fam-
ilies,” McGirr said. “It’s
a grueling pace. We eat
together, sleep together.”
That creates a camara-
derie that allows the vet-
Chronicle. “We know it, and
it’s time to hold that industry
accountable for the damage
they’ve caused.”
West
Coast
crab-
bers experienced signifi-
cant losses starting in the
2015-16 season when mas-
sive algal blooms caused
by warm ocean tempera-
tures resulted in a domoic
acid outbreak that reduced
the length of the crabbing
season.
The season was cut short
again in 2016-17 for the
same reason.
In California, Dunge-
ness crab brought in over
$47 million in 2017 and $83
million in 2016; the amount
was down to $17 million in
2015, during the industry’s
first major problem with
domoic acid.
Crab is the most valuable
ADVERTISING
Regional Publisher and Revenue Director:
Christopher Rush
541-278-2669 • crush@eomediagroup.com
Advertising Services:
Angela Treadwell
541-966-0827 • atreadwell@eastoregonian.com
Grace Bubar
541-276-2214 • gbubar@eastoregonian.com
Multimedia Consultants:
• Kimberly Macias
541-278-2683 • kmacias@eastoregonian.com
• Jeanne Jewett
541-564-4531 • jjewett@eastoregonian.com
• Dayle Stinson
541-278-2670 • dstinson@eastoregonian.com
• Audra Workman
541-564-4538 • aworkman@eastoregonian.com
single species commercial
fishery in Oregon, with an
average harvest of 16 mil-
lion pounds per season, the
Statesman Journal in Salem,
reported.
There are nearly 1,000
Dungeness crab permit
holders in California and
Oregon.
Scott J. Silvestri, corpo-
rate media relations manager
of Exxon Mobil Corp., said
in an email to the Chroni-
cle that reducing greenhouse
gas emissions is a global
issue and requires global
participation and actions.
“Lawsuits like this —
filed by trial attorneys
against an industry that pro-
vides products we all rely
upon to power the economy
and enable our domestic life
— simply do not do that,” he
said.
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