Ariz. wildfire burns out of control

MSNBC ^ | 06/20/03 | Associated Press

[bedolido]

TUCSON, Ariz., June 20 — A wildfire that destroyed 200 to 250 homes in an Arizona vacation town continued out of control Friday, with firefighters not optimistic that they’ll be able to save other property in the line of fire.

WITH HIGH WINDS and low humidity expected to hinder their efforts, “there’s not a thing happening that’s on our side,” said Larry Humphrey, who is leading the team fighting the fire that ripped through the main street of Summerhaven. Driven by winds reaching up to 60 mph, the fire roared across Mount Lemmon in less than an hour Thursday, destroying half the homes there while sparing others. Humphrey said firefighters managed to save about 60 homes and had thought they would be able to preserve another 30. But he said it could take two to three weeks to contain the fire, which had grown to around 4,000 acres.

[bedolido]

Smoke billows from the fire atop Arizona's Mount Lemmon on Thursday. Half the homes in a community on the mountain are thought to have been destroyed.

[Between the Lines]

Our prayers for the people in the Summerhaven area.

[Grampa Dave]

Sorry to hear about this.

Ebuck, Mad Fly fyi

[dixiechick2000]

This is criminal!

[ASOC]

Going to be a awhile before any Scouts get to hike the HoHoKum trail....
Bummer, spent many a summer up on the mountain.
The ski resort smoked as well?

[bedolido]

fyi

[Lil'freeper]

Bummer, spent many a summer up on the mountain.

ditto. It's a pretty special place for a lot of kids. This is a big loss.

[TYVets]

MSNBC nor AP give a clue as to the ownership of the lands where the fire started and is burning now.

Another case of reporting that omits who manages this forest?

[BurbankKarl]

To be fair to the news outlets, the USFS webpage for this area had not been updated as of last night.

[MD_Willington_1976]

Well here we go again another scorched earth summer....Just last week a friend of ours was heading out in Cali to fight fires, he didnt make it, apparently he had a "head on" into a tree...end of story instantly...You guys stay safe.

[Lil'freeper]

iirc, it's the Coronado Nat'l Forest. The properties are probably leased from the USFS.

[berserker]

give a clue as to the ownership of the lands where the fire started and is burning now. Another case of reporting that omits who manages this forest?

Looks like its right smack in the middle of a national forest.

[HiTech RedNeck]

What about that humongo Russian transport plane which carries about a jillion gallons of water? The US forest service has, to date, been too proud to use it.

[Grampa Dave]

Sorry to hear about your friend.

We will be in special fire danger this year. Of course we still have the no logging, no roads and no brush removal of decades in our forests. That by itself has made most of our forests into tinder boxes.

Then in late April and early May we had massive amounts of rainfall in N. California. That prolonged and accelerated the growth of grasses, weeds and other combustables which normally ceases in early May. So our tinderboxes have more timber in them.

Sorry to hear about your friend and the tree. What was the outcome?

[AAABEST]

Sorry to hear about this.

Yeah really. 250 homes? This is the first I'm hearing of this, how awful.

[HiJinx]

Chances are good it'll all go...and that is a terrible thing.

My boss, a scout leader, had to cut short his troop's camp-out because of the fire. I don't know if the scout camp has been over-run, but I suspect it is in danger of that. They weren't required to leave last year, and last year's fire burned to within a coupla miles of the camp.

DL, are any other Tucson FReepers aware of this thread? Can you provide any details? I'm just a little too far away in Sierra Vista to be of any help...

[nothingnew]

Here we go again. "'I survived the Winter of '92"...and the Missionary Ridge Fire'".

If anyone has a wildfire ping list, please add me to it...Thanks in advance.

FMCDH (Durango,CO)

[adam_az]

I hope the observatory doesn't burn.... That would be a hugh and series loss!

[adam_az]

I hope the state or federal gov doesn't use this as a land grab to turn Summerhaven into more national parkland.

[bedolido]

I think we lost some smoke-jumpers in that fire (Idaho here). That was terrible. about that time we had a 200,000 acre fire in the Boise National Forrest. Got very little coverage.

we have a contingent (sp) of Indian fire fighters here. These guys (and girls) are great. Tough and ready to fight fires.

[JimSEA]

Very sad. It has been twenty years since I was last up there. We used to live in San Manuel, Oracle and Tucson at various times when I worked for Magma Copper in the 60's 70's and 80's. The drive from Oracle up the back road to Mount Lemon was a lot of fun. Our prayers for the families and hope for an end to the drought down there.

[DLfromthedesert]

This is so awful. The beautiful rustic dining area (Alpine Lodge) is gone. I took a lot of visiting relatives for back east there.

I feel horrible for the people who lost their cabins. My prayers with all of them.

[discostu]

Yeah it really sucks. I'm kind of without words on this one.

[Lil'freeper]

I don't know if the scout camp has been over-run,

A strange bit of history: Back when I was a girl scout I did my Gold Award project up there. I took a tattered bit of very old fire line and rehabed it into a nice little nature trail. It's gone now, I'm sure. Ironic, perhaps.

[HiJinx]

I feel horrible...My prayers with all of them.

You're good people, you know that?

[HiJinx]

Ironic, perhaps, yes. But let's look for the silver lining...some other girl is going to be able to go in there in two or three years and do a project on forest recovery after a wildfire.

[cyncooper]

This is so awful.

It is awful.

I'm on the NW side and can't see Mt.Lemmon from our house (other homes in the way), but just went upstairs and looked out the window and it's clear as a bell everywhere except for a huge "cloud" that I know is not a cloud...

Going out in a bit. As soon as I get to the end of our street and hang a right the Catalinas are before me and I can usually see the observatory. Will get a better look then.

[cyncooper]

Ping for pictures of our wonderful (but ablaze) mountain.

[farmfriend]

Rights, farms, environment ping.

Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.

[DLfromthedesert]

Hmmmm ..... well, maybe most of the time... I'd hate for yo9u to see me when I'm not ... LOL!!

[AZamericonnie]

It's so windy today, not good conditions at all.

[hattend]

Or how about a 747?

[nothingnew]

we have a contingent (sp) of Indian fire fighters here. These guys (and girls) are great. Tough and ready to fight fires.

Here too. I was working part time at a Texaco/mini-mart during the fire...policy was give the cops their softdrinks fre, unless they refused that...I started giving the firefighters theirs free and questioned by the manager about it...My employment there was ended soon after. I was glad.

FMCDH

[EBUCK]

Here we go.

Stay safe AZ folks.

[E.G.C.]

Our thoughts and prayers are with the folks in Arizona. This is a really bad deal.

[Grampa Dave]

Scary as this is ahead of the normal cycle of wild fires that go counter clockwise each year, starting in Floriduh in the summer time.

Stay safe in Oregone Land.

[EBUCK]

I gotta get out and clear some of the brush from around my place this weekend.

[HiJinx]

"I'd hate for you to see me when I'm not"

Oh, I'm sure that if you were being bad, it'd be for a good reason! LOL!!!

Here's some more from the Citizen regarding the Alpine Lodge:
"Even as flames swept through Summerhaven on Mount Lemmon yesterday, some of the tightknit community's business owners vowed to return and rebuild."

"We're going on the premise that everything is gone and that we're going to start over and start fresh," said Don Underhill, owner of Alpine Lodge."

[tbird1]

11 AM news conference:
1. Absolutely no containment of the fire at this time.
2. Possible 200 homes destroyed
3. No hope of containment in near future. Will probably be
3 weeks of firefighting to contain and control it.
4. Fire commander says he thinks 15 to 20 homes have been
saved.
5. High winds are blowing again today, and that will even
keep the air assault grounded this afternoon.

It appears that a popular landmark is being destroyed before our eyes.
tbird1--Green Valley

[HiJinx]

That is too true...but the silver lining is that, as mentioned earlier, the business owners up there say they're planning to rebuild.

The old Summerhaven may not exist after this fire, but the spirit of the place will live on and the residents will (I hope) show how tough Arizonans can be.

Prayers up.

[discostu]

And meanwhile the eastern range (28 years here and I still can't remember which range is which) has a BIGGER fire, but no property to speak of to get destroyed. Real mess.

[HiJinx]

The panorama created by the Rincon Mountains in the foreground and the Santa Catalina Mountains in the background shows the expanse of smoke from the Helen II (right) and Aspen (left) fires. (This view is from east to west, with the city of Tucson to the left of the picture...HJ)
~ GARY GAYNOR/Tucson Citizen

This is from my post on the Canteen this morning...somebody somewhere noted that the Helen II fire isn't getting any press because there isn't much if any potential for property or personal damage from that fire...

[discostu]

And it's on the mountain face that I'd swear was designed by God to burn. Seems every few years that one gets lit and it spreads down the mountain real nice. Because of Saguaro East there's no property at risk until long after it hits flat land. This is two years in a row the Catalina's have gone up though, that's a little scary given how far north the town has expanded in the last decade.

[HiJinx]

Scary, indeed.

I saw the smoke from Helen II yesterday on the way to work and thought that the north end of the Whetstones, past Kartchner Caverns, were burning. I had no idea it was coming from so much further north and east.

[discostu]

We can watch Aspen from my ofice window. Noticed yesterday that it had gotten much bigger, hit azstarnet for the official word, read the marshal saying "Summer Haven is gone" and just stopped cold. It's still stunning to think of it. My uncle was just up there a couple weeks ago.

[SGCOS]

Article from a year ago today

[HiJinx]

You just made me think of something...

This is exactly what happened to the folks living up north in the area burned out by the Rodeo-Chedeski fire. We never think of it happening to us...until it happens to us.

I'm still thinking the Summerhaven residents will bounce back from this.

[discostu]

Well we had a fire on the Catalina's last year. I remember it started right after we'd sent a bunch of firefighters to help with Rodeo-Chedeski. Then we had a big warehouse fire on the south side of town and between the two smelled like LA for almost a week.

In times like this I always think of Buzz Aldrin's wife. One of the times LA was burning some reporter was heading into a ritzy neighborhood that was being evacuuated taking notes on the stuff people were taking with them (whole garmet racks of clothes, piles and piles of videos, dishes, stupid stuff), he looks over and sees a woman with two shopping bags of stuff. Shocked he takes a closer look and recognizes her as Mrs. Aldrin. So he goes over and asks what she's taking, "photo albums and stuff Buzz brought back from the moon, everything else can be replaced". Smart woman, useful advice.

[SGCOS]

Remember Bitterroot?