2006 Fire Season Roll Call

[ill-advised strategy]

I just did 20 supply orders! in Ross! and I'm on hold with a bus company!

my will to live is waning. seriously. I actually found that phrase somewhere in my mind today..."the will to live"...yes, not too strong right now.

on the plus side the word is that the previously mentioned "diversity" assistant at OLF is declining the job and they're working on filling me from the earlier cert. I bet they'll re-fly and re-fill with some other diversity candidate, but there's always hope.

I also applied for a job in Ogden, even though ogden makes me vomit a little into my mouth.

[ill-advised strategy]

heh...somebody just named one of their fires the



wait for it



Dixon Hole!

priceless.

[SherpaStyle]

Yep, season's crankin. We just got back from a 2 week tour of MT. 7 fires in 14 days. It was a pretty crazy roll. We did a little of everything from cutting hotline, to structure triage, to runnin' an gunnin' burnouts, to urban-interface IAs, to mop up. It seemed like 4 rolls in one. I didn't take many pictures cause I was running squadie most of the time and most of the fires that were worth taking pictures of were way too active to pull out the camera. I'll try to get some pictures up at some point.

When we heard about Burns' run in with Augusta we were debating how our crew would have reacted. It would have been interesting. Depending who got to him first he either would have been tied up on the floor by one of the 3 all-american wrestlers on our crew with the other 19 of us circled around him yelling "arm bar" or he would have been whimpering in the corner after the verbal lashing he would have received from the more intellectually inclined members of the crew. They really need to make a reality TV show about a shot crew. It'd be hard to find a network that would broadcast it though...maybe HBO.

Stay safe out there. It's gonna be a long season!

[zion zig zag]

I also applied for a job in Ogden, even though ogden makes me vomit a little into my mouth.

Maybe we'll meet in the urban interface, where i'll proceed to roll you with the deck gun.

[ill-advised strategy]

...i'll proceed to roll you with the deck gun.

Make sure you get some silvex in my eyes fartknocker.

[P_McPoser]

Just got back from Elko. Watched N699RH (Rainer Heli) and a bunch of other helis and fixed wings making runs on the Basco fire near Elko between my meetings and training classes. Pretty neat hardware. Saw the Winters fire off in the distance from I-80 on my way home today. That one is burning about 10 miles north of the mine. Hasn't caused us any problems yet, but another one of our mines to the east of the fire had to shut down due to pulling smoke into the ventialtion system.

[P_McPoser]

Back at work today. Little bit of smoke for some reason. Stay tuned, I'm about to head up into the hills behind the mine site and try to get some photos of [announcer voice] The largest fire in The United States [/anouncer voice].

[RootSkier]

When we heard about Burns' run in with Augusta we were debating how our crew would have reacted. It would have been interesting.

Last night at dinner we were talking about this. We all agreed he should have said it to a MT-based firefighter who then should have cold cocked his ass.

That person would be world famous, and acquitted.

[Meadow Skipper]

Last night at dinner we were talking about this. We all agreed he should have said it to a MT-based firefighter who then should have cold cocked his ass.

That person would be world famous, and acquitted.

And never would have had to buy a drink for themself again for the rest of their lives.

[ill-advised strategy]

got a call today:

the OLF thing is still not dead. Still working on it up there.

Still hope.

[FreakofSnow]

Wow, impressive fire behavior today in W. Montana (Gash Creek fire). We hiked up to the upper part of Division Charlie and staged (you know, general EMT line slug stuff). The morning was calm and they expected mild winds, 5 - 7 mph. Well around 3pm, the wind started raging. They then issued a red flag warning and we started getting pretty sustained gusts out of the west at 40 mph. A massive bowl of timber, prob. 500 acres ripped off and capped out the column. The winds were squirrely and erie. Huge plumes were dumping out of the bowl to the north of us, looking much closer than they were. We had a slopover up on the ridge and it looks like it might break into a new drainage. If it does that, its gonna open a huge chapter on this fire.

Low RH: 12

[VC]

Just back from the shasta trinity, last day off was july 12. Three days down and right back to the same fire. Tied in one part of the fire in 14 days, about 6 miles of indirect burnt mostly in the wilderness.

The season is gonna be a long one, stay safe. Don't know all the details but Eldorado got split and a couple guys got burnt, nothing life threatning but just keep yours heads up.

[P_McPoser]

Finally got some pics from the winters fire which was burning by the mine I work at a few weeks ago. Don't know the final numbers but it was 200k+ acres I think.
Most pictures courtesy the BLM.

Setting a Backfire



Blow up on July 30 or 31


Heli dunkin' the bucket. (This guy hit the release on the bucket by accident later, lost his gear on the bottom of the lake)


Snorkelin'


One of my companies dozers lended a hand ripping some line.

[P_McPoser]

more pics............................

The line (I like this pic a lot for some reason, looks really cool!)


Camp


Snorkel again.


Flames


Distance Shot




If anyone's interested, I can post some more showing the Wild Horses and stuff hanging around the un-burned islands in the fire area.

[ill-advised strategy]

sweet, I like when there's a kmax and a skycrane.

that must have been some superdooper high-priority sagebrush.

[Meadow Skipper]

sweet, I like when there's a kmax and a skycrane.

that must have been some superdooper high-priority sagebrush.

Heh, just ask the local Nevada ranchers that have the grazing allotments. Actually, no need to ask - they'll be in your face, except for the ones that are busy screaming to their congressional reps.

[P_McPoser]

sweet, I like when there's a kmax and a skycrane.

that must have been some superdooper high-priority sagebrush.

#2 priority for a while. We actually had 4 helis I think, we had one of the MAFFS or whatever black hawks too.

As far as high priority sage brush goes, yeah, but it was probably because the sagebrush surrounded some high priority tax revenue sources (mines and ranches).

[ill-advised strategy]

I made the cert for an ogden ast. foreman.

I'm driving to the OLF tonight to meet with fire staff, hopefully friday.

I'm not giving up.

Dispatch rots, I'm going to find my way out.

[RootSkier]

Here is the Gash Fire and fire camp in the Bitterroot National Forest, just west of Victor, MT last week. Burning some sweet ski terrain = awesome.



And the smoke helps with the sunsets.



Hundreds of lightning strikes last night...should be interesting to see what flares up in the next couple of days. Oh, and now the wind is picking up and gusting hard.

[Meadow Skipper]

Here is the Gash Fire and fire camp in the Bitterroot National Forest, just west of Victor, MT last week. Burning some sweet ski terrain = awesome.

Whoa, that gave me like a total flashback to 2000.

Hundreds of lightning strikes last night...should be interesting to see what flares up in the next couple of days. Oh, and now the wind is picking up and gusting hard.

Whoa! So did that.

[ak_telemike]

I made the cert for an ogden ast. foreman.

I'm driving to the OLF tonight to meet with fire staff, hopefully friday.

I'm not giving up.

Dispatch rots, I'm going to find my way out.

good luck man - keep pushing - you'll find something better

[13]

http://www.nifc.gov/fireinfo/nfn.html

Things spooled up quickly. Watch each other's backs.

[Meadow Skipper]

http://www.nifc.gov/fireinfo/nfn.html

Things spooled up quickly. Watch each other's backs.

A military battalion's been assigned to the Tripod Complex in WA. Those can be pretty interesting assignments for the civilian cadre (MCADs, STLMs, BNML):
http://www.inciweb.org/incident/news/article/341/1481/

And there's a planeload of Ozzies and Kiwis running around the states. They're fun guys:
http://www.inciweb.org/incident/news/article/341/1553/

[grrrr]

A military battalion's been assigned to the Tripod Complex in WA. Those can be pretty interesting assignments for the civilian cadre (MCADs, STLMs, BNML).

Actually they pretty much suck.

Once again, the hue and cry about shortages of firefighters kicks in, and the military is called while firefighters within 200 miles sit on their assess waiting for an assignment. Gotta love the politics in fire.

[Meadow Skipper]

Actually they pretty much suck.

I suppose it depends - I went out twice with the military and it was pretty good duty both times. For a big fire, that is - nothing's better than IA.

Once again, the hue and cry about shortages of firefighters kicks in, and the military is called while firefighters within 200 miles sit on their assess waiting for an assignment. Gotta love the politics in fire.

It's not that they aren't being asked for, it that they aren't being let go. All politics is local.