Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Hang in there


As we write this editorial, Bassett Gulch on the west side of Bald Mountain is going up in flames, spot fires have erupted ahead of the fire, and Warm Springs Road residents have been ordered to evacuate.

We watched Bald Mountain today from our downtown Ketchum office. A darkly pink and wide smoke column announced the Castle Rock Fire's arrival at the top within view of the Lookout Restaurant about 1 p.m.

The smoke plume could be seen from as far away as Twin Falls.

The mood in Ketchum is tense but calm as people strain to hear the chatter on radio scanners, look at the Baldy Web cam, check official fire information sources and look for flames on the mountainside. Cars and trucks are loaded with what residents could carry from homes.

Helicopters and air tankers are doggedly dropping water and retardant to try to stop the fire that on a map looks like PacMan—with Baldy in its jaws.

Gallows humor prevails in our offices with talk of the great glade skiing and newly bulldozed ski runs to come—even as we place sprinklers on the office roof—just in case.

At last night's community meeting, Incident Commander Jeanne Pincha-Tulley said that bulldozer crews had cut a new run off the top of Seattle Ridge on Sunday. Someone in the audience immediately suggested that if she and her crews save Baldy's lifts—the economic lifeblood of the valley in the winter—that the run should be named "Pincha-Tulley's." Good idea.

The unflappable commander and her brave crews have a fight on their hands. We're still optimistic that they'll win.

This fire has been stubborn and tricky, fueled by dry timber, brush and the worst drought in memory. As the West's wildfires go, this one is small in acreage but dagger-dangerous because of its location near Ketchum and the Wood River Valley.

Before the fire in Bassett Gulch broke out today, fire crews had furiously tried to ring the 41,000-acre tree-eater with fire breaks wherever it flared, crews beat it at its own game.

The very idea that crews had to burn everything around some houses in order to save them speaks to the flames' ferocity.

One office wag reminded us that former President Ronald Reagan once said, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

Here in the Wood River Valley, they were the nine most welcome words. Not since New Orleans has one community so needed local, state and federal government crews of firefighters and national guardsmen.

Hang in there everyone.




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