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Smoke persists
By Carole Cloudwalker
This document was published online on Friday, August 29, 2008
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| The incident command center has moved from the Wapiti Ranger Station to Buffalo Bill State Park. The Gunbarrel Fire (above) was fed by high winds Thursday. (Photo by Ken Blackbird) |
High winds that whipped the Gunbarrel Fire into high gear earlier in the week calmed by Friday, but the blaze gained interior acreage and has charred a total of 92 square miles.
Fire managers say most of the blaze's advance was in the backcountry, though burning generated a great deal of thick smoke Wednesday.
Dave Eaker, information officer with the Great Basin National Incident Management Team that now is in charge of fighting the fire, said the same high winds and thick smoke that struck fear into those living downwind from the fire actually helped slow its progress.
“The smoke blew over onto the area of the fire, lowering humidity and temperatures,” Eaker said.
The same thick smoke apparently caused Wapiti resident Charles Kirkham's smoke detector and carbon monoxide detector to emit tones at 1:30 a.m. Friday.
He said that had not occurred since the detectors were installed many years ago.
“I shut the window and went back to sleep,” he said.
Kirkham added that one of his neighbors who has a summer home near him planned to go back to Texas early because both he and his wife were feeling ill from inhaling so much smoke.
The Gunbarrel Fire is burning along many miles of the North Fork, primarily in the Shoshone Forest's North Absaroka Wilderness among beetle- or disease-killed timber.
Eaker said with that kind of fuel in its path, the fire, which gained several thousand acres Wednesday, could have experienced much larger growth if the smoke cover had not slowed it during the red-flag warning period of high winds.
Eaker said the fire has burned in a mosaic pattern, leaving some areas uncharred.
That means when trees regenerate, there will be a variety of sizes and types, providing a healthy forest in future years.
On Wednesday, that benefit was difficult to envision for former outfitter and Red Pole Ranch operator Don Schmalz, who for some 38 years led hunters in quest of bighorn sheep in the area that the fire now has burned near Big Creek and Jim Creek.
While he retired from outfitting about five years back, Schmalz said those still in the business are in a world of hurt this season.
“Sheep hunters have no place to go” along the North Fork, he said.
Since a single sheep hunt brings in some $6,000-$7,000 for the outfitter, this will mean severe economic loss, he added.
From the vantage point of his ranch overlooking the fire, Schmalz said the thick smoke clouds Wednesday “looked to me like the A-bomb testing in the desert in the 1950s,” with “big, mushroom clouds behind Black Mountain.”
He said he was surprised the next day to hear reports from forest officials that the fire “had not gone outside its boundaries.”
Critical of Forest Service policy that allows backcountry fires to burn, Schmalz wondered aloud to Forest Supervisor Becky Aus recently, “Why didn't you guys just put it out?”
The Gunbarrel Fire started on July 26 with a lightning strike in the wilderness area.
Schmalz said he and his wife were on horseback up Pagoda Creek when the Gunbarrel Fire was “just a puff of smoke out of Grizzly Creek.”
“We don't have to do this all in one lifetime,” the ex-outfitter said of reducing the number of beetle-killed trees.
He cited a cartoon that described a one-in-a-100-year flood and eight 100-year fire events, with a caption mentioning that all wildland problems seem to be taken care of for the next 500 years.
Now, Schmalz fears, “the fire will go wherever the wind tells it to go; it will go where it wants to go.”
He said because of the smoke that surrounds the Red Pole Ranch, located across a gravel road from the Buffalo Bill State Park where the fire camp now is located, he and his wife are “thinking of taking a drive just to get some air,” adding that “up the river would work” for that purpose.
Meanwhile, fire managers say fire activity was moderate Thursday, bringing little perimeter growth.
The most active areas of the fire were in the Trout, Jim and Gunnysack creeks, but the northeastern section of the fire has advanced to near the Robber's Roost Creek Drainage. It still is several miles from the Rattlesnake drainage and the Mooncrest Ranch, however.
Crews continued structure protection measures along the North Fork corridor Friday and made preparations for additional protection at other areas of the fire.
A successful burnout operation was conducted near the Goff Creek Lodge, and crews continued structure protection in several areas.
Helicopter support aided their efforts as wind conditions permitted, and crews finished burning out remaining fuels along between Elephant Head and Goff Creek lodges.
The fire was considered 16 percent contained Friday, with 59,147 acres charred. Suppression costs climbed to $8 million and 569 people were working on the blaze.
There were no evacuation advisories associated with the fire as of Friday, and the North Fork highway (US 14-16-20) from Cody to Yellowstone remains open.
All business along the road have resumed normal operations.
The closure area on the Shoshone Forest extends from the Sweetwater Creek drainage to the forest boundary and north almost to Chief Joseph Scenic Byway.
Check with the Shoshone Forest for more details by calling 527-6921.
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old grouch wrote on Sep 2, 2008 9:11 AM: