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Blue Mountain Eagle
FIRE
Continued from Page A1
Eagle file photo
Summer school students write on a white board
in this file photo. School starts soon for local
districts.
School is soon
back in session
Blue Mountain Eagle
Sharpen the pencils, ill
the backpacks and watch out
for buses — Grant County
students return to school this
month. Monument and Day-
ville students begin school
Monday, Aug. 22.
Students at Grant Union,
Humbolt Elementary, Seneca,
Prairie City and Long Creek
begin class on Aug. 29.
At Grant Union, junior
high students in grades 7 and
8 start Monday, Aug. 29, with
high school students joining in
the following day.
A TTENTION L ADIES
Ratified on Aug. 18, 1920:
Amendment XIX.*
The right of citizens of
the United States to vote
shall not be denied or
abridged by the United
States or by any State on
account of sex.
Congress shall have
power to enforce this
article by appropriate
legislation.
helicopter rappel crews flew
to the scene. The smoke-
jumpers arrived first, so the
helicopter crews had to wait,
he said, but the smokejump-
ers could not jump directly to
the fire area and had to hike
in from the meadow below.
He said they did not reach
the fire until 11:30 a.m.,
though planes were dropping
retardant by 11 a.m.
At 5:41 p.m., a helicop-
ter was reassigned from the
Mason Springs Fire, which
was still within its contain-
ment lines, to the Berry
Creek Fire, which continued
to grow, according to a For-
est Service report about the
2015 fire season. At 9:10
p.m., the report states, a spot
fire jumped the retardant
and control lines, and the
firefighters were pulled off
the Berry Creek Fire due to
aggressive fire behavior. A
firefighter was also trans-
ported to the hospital for
heat exhaustion, the report
states, and a larger Type 3
management team was re-
quested.
The Mason Springs Fire
was still contained within
the fire lines that evening,
Walker said. A firefighter
who worked the fire said the
engine crews camped near
the fire line overnight and
began working to mop up the
fire the next morning.
At 8:28 a.m. Aug. 13, the
Berry Creek Fire was es-
timated to be 50 acres and
actively burning, and the
Mason Springs Fire was still
contained at about 10 acres,
according to the Forest Ser-
vice report. At 10:30 a.m.,
air tankers were dropping
retardant on the Berry Creek
Fire, and hand crews were
constructing fire line on the
Berry Creek Fire and rein-
forcing the lines on the Ma-
son Springs Fire.
At about 2 p.m. Aug. 13,
with high winds, Walker
said a spot fire was discov-
ered outside the lines on
the Mason Springs Fire that
firefighters were unable to
C ONGRATULATIONS
to all of the 4H/FFA
members at this year’s fair!
Thank you to all the supporters who
made the sale a huge success.
Wednesday, August 17, 2016
contain. The report states a
helicopter, two air tankers
and one bulldozer respond-
ed, and the Type 3 manage-
ment team from the Berry
Creek Fire assumed control
of both fires and continued
to share resources between
them. By the end of the day,
the report states, the Mason
Springs Fire had grown to
500 acres and jumped High-
way 395, and an even larger
Type 2 management team
was ordered.
The following day, with
30 mph winds recorded
mid-morning, the fire spread
down Canyon Creek toward
Canyon City, and a Type 1
management team, the larg-
est, was ordered, accord-
ing to the report. Gov. Kate
Brown invoked the Emer-
gency Conflagration Act,
authorizing the request for
local firefighters to respond,
and 12 engines and 32 vol-
unteer firefighters respond-
ed to assist Canyon City, the
report states. Despite their
efforts, the two fires burned
together, according to the
report, and 39 homes were
destroyed as the fire grew to
22,000 acres that day.
The Canyon Creek Com-
plex was designated as the
nation’s top ire priority on
Aug. 16, the report states, and
the Type 1 management team
took control as more resourc-
es responded to ight the ire.
By Aug. 19, the report states
more than 900 people were
ighting the ire, but it could
not be extinguished until
September after growing to
110,000 acres and destroying
43 homes.
Burning questions
a year later
A sizable crowd of about
100 people gathered at the
Forest Supervisor’s Ofice to
ask questions about the ire
on short notice Tuesday after
the meeting was announced
Sunday.
John Day resident Howard
Gieger asked if another pub-
lic meeting could be sched-
uled with more notice and
said he believed an indepen-
dent investigation of the ire
should be conducted.
Beverlin, the forest super-
visor who served as agency
administrator on the ire, said
the community is free to fund
and conduct an independent
investigation. He said he
hoped the community could
move forward and heal af-
ter this meeting, rather than
schedule another. He said,
however, the Forest Service
would take and respond to
written questions.
A woman who lost her
home in the ire asked why
more resources were not sent
to put out the ire when it was
known high winds were ex-
pected the afternoon of Aug.
13.
Walker said they were
aware of the weather and
had all available resources
ighting the ire. He said in-
cident commanders on ires
throughout the West would
all agree there were not
enough resources available
to ight all the ires that year.
“Everybody was out of
ireighters at that point,” he
said. “... We just ran out of
people.”
Beverlin said obtaining
additional resources would
be easy this year because
there are fewer fires. He
said, in contrast, the 12,000-
acre Rail Fire currently
burning near Unity has twice
as many crews fighting the
fire than were on the Can-
yon Creek Complex, which
was twice the size, when the
Type 1 management team
took over.
Traci Weaver, who served
as a public information of-
ficer on the fire, said agen-
cies cannot afford to staff for
the worst-case scenario that
occurred with the “perfect
storm” of weather condi-
tions last year.
John Morris asked why a
bulldozer line was construct-
ed on his property without
his permission instead of on
Forest Service land. Bev-
erlin said he would have to
approve a dozer line on the
Strawberry Wilderness Area,
but he was not asked by the
firefighters in the field. He
said, in hindsight, he would
have approved a dozer line in
the wilderness, but he is not
sure if he would have granted
the request at the time.
Former ireighter Fritz
Phillips of John Day asked
why a Malheur National For-
est’s Facebook post indicated
the Mason Springs Fire had
been both contained and con-
trolled, the latter indicating
the ire is essentially out.
Beverlin admitted that
Phillips was right about the
post but said it was a mis-
communication
between
public information personnel
and the ire managers, who
never actually called the ire
controlled.
Someone asked if the
Mason Springs Fire was pa-
trolled the night of Aug. 12.
The ireighter in charge
said he walked a lap around
the ire that night before
camping beside it. Walker
added the fire was within the
containment lines the next
morning when firefighters
began working to extin-
guish hot spots. He said it
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Jessica Carter
Buyer: Iron Triangle
was contained until about 2
p.m. Aug. 13. Walker said
no one saw how the spot fire
that jumped the containment
lines started. He speculated
that cutting down a hazard-
ous tree at about that time
may have sent an ember be-
yond the lines.
Another person asked
why it took firefighters so
long to respond to the Berry
Creek Fire, stating it was re-
ported at 6 a.m. but firefight-
ers did not arrive on scene
until 11 a.m.
Walker said, if someone
reported the fire at 6 a.m.,
it was not logged in dis-
patch, but he said it was
hectic with 12 fires reported
that day. He said the Ber-
ry Creek Fire was reported
and logged in dispatch at
7:22 a.m. He said aircraft
were en route by 8:50 a.m.,
but the smokejumpers who
were over the fire first had
to jump to the meadow be-
low and hike in.
Someone asked Walker
what the firefighters had
learned if a similar situation
occurred in the future.
Walker said, in hind-
sight, he wished he would
have kept the two hand
crews he released when
Burns requested them, even
though Burns sent one crew
back when he requested it.
He said the work order for
the helicopter took too long,
and the helicopter should
have been launched sooner.
He said he has already asked
the night dispatchers to con-
tact him sooner if something
occurs — and they have this
year — so he can direct the
operations sooner.
A woman who described
the fire as “an act of God”
asked Beverlin if policies
and procedures could be
changed from the top down
to prevent catastrophic fires
from occurring in the future.
Beverlin said firefighters
perform after action reviews
after every incident to try to
learn from them.
“Because of the signif-
icant number of fatalities
that have happened on wild-
fires, there are some real
strict safety guidelines that
we have to comply with,”
he said.
Although no one was
killed on the Canyon Creek
Complex, the National In-
teragency Fire Center re-
ports 164 wildland firefight-
ing fatalities from 2006 to
2015. Of those, 46 were for
medical reasons, such as a
heart attack, but many were
from entrapment, burnovers
and other accidents. At least
one firefighter has died each
year since 1958, accord-
ing to NIFC, and more than
1,000 firefighters have died
in the last 100 years.
“... There’s that balance
of safety of firefighters and
then aggressive suppression
efforts,” Beverlin said.
Please call
541-523-2522
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for movies
and
showtimes.
Jesaka Culley
Buyer: Iron Triangle
$9 Adult, $7 Senior (60+), Youth
Erika Dickens
Buyer: Standard TV & Appliance
and Gander Ranch
04290
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Hannah Vaughan
Buyer: Doug’s Motor Vehicle Repair
R ESERVE G RAND C HAMPIONS
Robbins Farm Equipment
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Buyer: Chester’s Thriftway
Cowen Weaver
Buyer: Willow Creek Trucking
Ellie Justice
Buyer: Chester’s
Thriftway
3850 10th St.
Baker City
10218 Wallowa Lake Hwy.
La Grande
1160 S Egan
Burns
86812 Christmas Valley Hwy.
Christmas Valley
541-523-6377
541-963-6577
541-573-6377
541-523-6377