After reading some of the other blog posts I feel like an outsider as I am not a wildland firefighter, nor have I ever been. However, since I have lived in Oregon for most of my life I have definitely been around wildland fires and some that have been a little too close for comfort. Although I have lived in Oregon for 20 years now, my biggest scare related to fire was during last summer when I was working as an intern with the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife in John Day.
On August 12th, several of us from the John Day office headed to Burns for a Regional meeting and on our way home we saw two different fires start. During that time the fires were not much concern to us as they were several miles from our office and seemed to be under control. However on Friday August 14th the winds picked up with gusts around 40 mph and the two fires quickly merged and headed down the canyon towards Canyon City and John Day.
At around 12pm on the 14th I headed off to lunch in John Day and when I came out of the restaurant I saw the huge plume of smoke that looked fairly close to the ODFW office. I quickly jumped in my car and headed back to the office in order to see what was going on and where we were needed. As I returned back to the office, we all gathered around the radio to hear the calls and soon after jumped in our trucks to help OSP with evacuation notices. We drove right towards the fire as it was coming down the canyon and when we reached the top of the hill, we watched the fire quickly grow and threaten several houses.When we returned back to the office we all called it a day as the smoke was getting to thick for us to breathe and several co-workers had already left in order to evacuate their houses.
Over the next several weeks the fire continued to grow until it reached over 100,000 acres and destroyed several homes. Luckily everyone from our office was safe and no one lost their house, but seeing the homes that were destroyed in the canyon was tough What still baffles my mind is how one house can burn, while the one standing right next to it doesn't. On several properties I could see that the fire line went right up to the house, but yet the house was still standing.
Also we were not on the front lines fighting the fire, the Canyon Creek Complex Fire still hit home for many people at ODFW and we still had to answer questions about the wildlife in the area. I know my experience is different from those who are wildland firefighters, but as a future wildlife biologist wildland fires will always affects my job and how I manage wildlife in a particular area.
This summer I will be working in the same area, except with the USFS instead of ODFW, and I am excited to see the effects of the fire a year later and how the land/wildlife is recovering,
These photos are some that I took near the ODFW office in John Day on the day the Canyon Creek Fire marched down the canyon.
That sounds like a really scary situation. It's also a great example on how the weather can affect the fires behavior. I too am returning to a post burn area this summer to see how the land is recovering. it's not for work but it will definitely be interesting to look at especially after taking this course. Also maybe this course can teach us why some of the house burned while others on the fire line did not. I too would like to know all of the reasons as to why that is!
ReplyDelete