LEAD-- A combined 684 federal, state and local personnel continued to fight the two-day-old Grizzly Gulch Fire Monday, as a federal Type 1 Interagency Management Team took command of the fire.

Federal fire information officer Maj. Mark Johnston said the fire grew to 6,200 acres overnight and was 10 percent contained by mid-day Monday. The fire remains the Rocky Mountain Region's number one priority, Johnston said.

Three homes have been destroyed by the fire but the occupants were not injured, Lawrence County Sheriff Rick Mowell told the Associated Press.

Deputies have finished scouring nearly all of the county and discovered nine barns, sheds and other buildings that were burned, Mowell said.

The fire was burning most actively on the eastern flank, east of Two Bit Road near Dome Mountain; on the southwest flank near Grizzly Gulch; and on the northern flank south of Lead.

One of the biggest worries throughout the morning Monday was a blowup burning near the Homestake Dam south of the Yates Shaft. The blowup threatened power lines near the Wasp Dump that serves Homestake water pumps. If the power lines fail, the pumps fail.

By 1 p.m., helicopters were dropping water on the blowup, and slurry bombers were reportedly on the way. Lead Mayor Tom Nelson said crews were clearing brush around the power lines Monday.

Most of Lead, with the exception of the Hurst sub-division and Sunnyhill area, was under mandatory evacuation orders Monday. Nelson said those evacuees probably would not be allowed to return home until the end of the week.

When evacuees from other areas will be allowed to return was undetermined Monday, Johnston said. "Safety is our utmost priority, for both firefighters and citizens," Johnston said.

Fire officials told the Associated Press on Monday that some Deadwood residents could be allowed to return to their homes as early as Tuesday.

"It's definitely in our gunsights," said Paul Hefner, a National Forest Service official in charge of the fire-fighting effort. "We're working to get the town opened up again. It won't happen today, but we might start doing something on a limited basis tomorrow."

"As soon as the electricity is fully restored and all emergency services are available, we will begin to let people back in," Gov. Bill Janklow said Monday. "I'm working on that right now."

The good news in Lead was slurry drops saved the 30 or so homes in the Washington area of Lead Sunday night, and winds Monday were blowing the fire east away from Lead. "The winds today are favorable to Lead," Nelson said.

That is bad news for residents east of Lead, including Galena residents, who are in the path of the fire.

So far, fire crews have saved two towns since the fire started Saturday afternoon. Slurry drops, a fire line and a timely shift in winds stopped the fire within feet of houses on the southeast side of Deadwood. Stands of blackened trees dotted the ridge between the Days of '76 Rodeo Grounds and Northern Hills General Hospital, but other parts of town remained untouched by flames.

A similar combination of slurry, fire lines and wind shifts saved Lead's Washington neighborhood next to the Open Cut Sunday evening, after embers jumped the Kirk Road, then jumped as much as a mile over the Homestake parking lot at the Yates Shaft.

"Crews kept the fire from going north to Central City and east to the homes," Nelson said. "They kept a line around it all night. That, and the Open Cut, the best fire break Homestake ever built."

Shifting winds created all kinds of different conditions throughout the area. Thick yellow smoke drifted into Rapid City Monday morning, only to dissipate by afternoon. And in Lead Monday afternoon, the skies were clear. One witness said that with her back to the fire, she wouldn't even know it was there if not for a faint odor of smoke.

The South Dakota Highway Patrol set up roadblocks at every major intersection heading into the fire area, while local cops patrolled Lead and Deadwood keeping onlookers out and watching for looters.

Denver Post

Serial arsonists suspected in 27 fires
By David Migoya
Denver Post Staff Writer

Wednesday, June 26, 2002 - A pair of serial arsonists might be responsible for 27 fires over four weeks in two Front Range counties, fire investigators said Tuesday.

Authorities are trying to figure out who did it - and why anyone would set a fire during this severe drought.

The small fires - 15 fires along the U.S. 285 corridor and 12 in Black Forest - might have been caused by serial arsonists intent on creating a disaster or merely thrilled by watching firefighters chase their handiwork, authorities in Jefferson and El Paso counties say.

"It could be one person or group of people or not, but to have 27 fires started by 27 different people is not a likely thing," said Investigator Chris Nelson, an arson specialist with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office, who discovered that the highway fires there might be linked.

Investigators said it is unlikely the same person set the fires in both counties. They are chasing leads but have named no suspects.

Nelson has even asked federal authorities to rule out one prominent but unlikely culprit: U.S. Forest Service employee Terry Lynn Barton. She was charged in U.S. District Court last week with starting the Hayman fire.

"Right now, no one is immune from suspicion," Nelson said.

In Black Forest, residents angry over the arsons have fire officials nervous.

"Everyone has their opinion about where they'd like to shoot this person," said David Ury, chief of the Black Forest Fire and Rescue District. "We're trying to keep our citizens from becoming a vigilante force."

The year began dry in Colorado, and wildfires began breaking out in April. By early June, conditions were so arid that federal officials banned fires on public lands. Within weeks, several other wildfires erupted, including the Hayman fire, which exploded into the state's largest in history.

As the state became tinder dry, arsonists went to work in Jefferson and El Paso counties.

The first of the arsons occurred on May 13 when three fires were set along U.S. 285 and Colorado 126 near Pine Junction, southwest of Conifer.

The last was a group of seven fires that were set Sunday in Black Forest, along the intersection of Elementary and Highline drives, officials there said. All the fires were set in grass or brush, not structures.

None of the fires has burned more than 900 square feet, but investigators worry that extreme drought conditions throughout the state - the kind that whipped the Hayman fire into the largest in Colorado history and shut down forests statewide - could quickly make for a disaster.

"It's very unsettling. With the horrible drought, it could have been devastating," said Sgt. James Groth, spokesman for the El Paso County Sheriff's Office, which is investigating the Black Forest fires. "It's absurd that anyone would do this."

Nelson said the spike in the number of fires in Jefferson County prompted him to look at them together rather than separately. The county usually has two or three arson fires a month, he said.

"That's when we started to see the pattern that they were all along 285," Nelson said, noting that details of each fire indicate they might be the work of the same person.

All the fires were ignited during the day, unusual for arsonists, he said.

"Typically, arsons occur between midnight and 3 a.m.," Nelson said. "These were during peak times of the day along heavilytraveled roads where someone would likely see the smoke and put it out."

The last two fires in Jefferson County were set June 11, one along Surrey Road near Aspen Park and another along North Turkey Creek near Indian Hills. Each fire was just off the highway, Nelson said.

"It's possible the ones who set (the fires) came back to watch the firefighters put them out," he said.

In Black Forest, authorities on Sunday battled seven small fires at one intersection just a week after putting out several roadside arson fires a couple of miles south.

The first of the Black Forest fires occurred along South Forest Drive and Old Ranch Road on June 9. A day later, firefighters were dousing a pair of fires just a halfmile away on Old Ranch Road. Then on June 17, two fires were reported on South Holmes Road, one in the morning and another in the evening.

Investigators found another location on the same road where an arsonist apparently tried, and failed, to start a third blaze that day.

"Black Forest is a heavily wooded area with lots of private houses," said El Paso County's Groth. "I can't overemphasize how dangerous those fires are in this drought."

The largest of the Black Forest fires, where homes average be tween $200,000 and $500,000, burned only 30 square feet, Groth said, and all were reported by residents.

A 74-acre wildfire in the spring "got everyone's attention" about the dangers of drought, fire chief Ury said.

"Now, with all the forest fires going on, how can anyone be so stupid, or so vindictive, as to do this?" Ury asked.

David Migoya can be reached at dmigoya@denverpost.com or 303-820-1506.

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