6A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL October 12, 2016
Restrictions ended, agencies look back
on a relatively calm 2016 fi re season
Numbers, types of
confl agrations pale in
comparison to sultry
2015 season
BY JON STINNETT
The Cottage Grove Sentinel
T
he recent removal of re-
strictions in place to curb
activities that could cause out-
door fi res has offi cially drawn
the fi re season of 2016 to a
close, a season perhaps only
remarkable in comparison to its
predecessor.
South Lane County Fire and
Rescue Chief John Wooten said
last week that the 2016 fi re sea-
son was “nothing compared to
last year,” an extremely dry sea-
son that featured major confl a-
grations throughout the Pacifi c
Northwest.
Within the 800-mile boundar-
ies of the South Lane district,
Wooten said fi refi ghters dealt
with but one threatening fi re,
that which burned a little over
three acres in a wooded area on
Mt. David on Wednesday, Aug.
24. Later that week, police and
fi re personnel responded to re-
ports of a fi re in a restroom at
Bohemia Park, then dealt with a
brush fi re set intentionally near
the Row River Trail outside
Walmart.
Three 15-year olds were sub-
sequently arrested in response
to those two fi res, arrests that
Wooten believed had curbed the
rash of arson happening in the
area.
“The Cottage Grove Police
Department arrested three in-
dividuals, and once they were
arrested, those kinds of fi res
stopped,” Wooten said. “That
leads me to believe that they
found the right individuals.”
The Lane County Sheriff’s
Offi ce is also still investigat-
Sentinel fi le photo
A helicopter belonging to timber company Weyerhaeus-
er pours retardant onto a fi re on Mt. David on Wednes-
day, Aug. 24.
ing what it believes to be arson
fi res at homes in Saginaw and
on Cedar Creek Road near Cot-
tage Grove Reservoir, Wooten
said, though statewide there
were only two major wildfi re
confl agrations in 2016. The Or-
egon Department of Forestry re-
ported 56 fi res on forested lands
it protects in the Western Lane
District; Wooten also gave cred-
it to cooperation between South
Lane and ODF for the speedy
response that helped extinguish
the Mt. David blaze.
Fire regulations ended on
the Umpqua National Forest
on Wednesday, Oct. 5, and the
Forest Service reported that the
2016 fi re season consisted of 40
fi res that burned a total of 8.3
acres. Of these, 13 were caused
by lightning, with the remainder
caused by humans.
“An astonishing 21 fi res were
started by abandoned campfi res,
a strong reminder of the impor-
tance of making sure campfi res
are cold to the touch before
leaving,” USFS’ Jennifer Tay-
lor wrote via news release last
week.
The Douglas Forest Protec-
tive Association also ended its
regulations last week, announc-
ing that the 2016 fi re season
began on June 8 and lasted 120
days. Firefi ghters suppressed
75 fi res, which burned 120 acre
on the Douglas District, with
the largest fi re of the year being
the Highway 138 West fi re on
Sept. 13 that burned 62 acres.
Lightning reportedly sparked
one fi re, which accounted for
1/10 acre burned, whereas 74
human-caused fi res burned the
bulk of this summer’s acreage.
These numbers are a far cry
from the brutal 2015 season,
which ODF called a “witches’
brew of drought, hot weather
and dry lightning,” in a sum-
mary report that pointed out
that these conditions spawned
more than 2000 wildfi res in Or-
egon alone, fi res that consumed
“some 631,000 acres of forest
and rangeland.”
According to the ODF news
release, the agency deployed
eight incident management
teams to support fi re suppression
efforts across the state in 2015.
The Oregon National Guard
supplied several helicopters and
fl ight crews, other equipment
and 375 personnel to form 18
fi re hand crews. The state fi re
marshals’ offi ce provided three
structural fi re teams, the Depart-
ment of Corrections provided
330 inmates from 10 institu-
tions to fi ght fi re and support
fi re camp operations. Resources
such as personnel, equipment
and aircraft came in from the
U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of
Land Management, 27 states
and two Canadian Provinces.
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