Blazes whip up new dangers

A lightning-caused wildfire exploded across a canyon Thursday and pushed to within three miles of The Dalles, prompting officials to urge the evacuation of 270 homes along rural roads west of the Columbia Gorge town.

Strong winds caused the Sheldon Ridge fire, burning since Tuesday south of Mosier, to grow from 200 to 3,000 acres. The blaze, which darkened the blue afternoon sky with an intimidating smoke plume that could be seen from across the gorge, was still heading east toward The Dalles late in the evening.

It was about three miles from downtown The Dalles and a quarter-mile from subdivisions near the junction of Upper Cherry Heights and Browns Creek roads, said Stan Hinatsu, a fire information officer with the Oregon Department of Forestry. "There are quite a few houses in those areas," he said.

Plans for further evacuations of The Dalles were being considered Thursday night, said Dave Wells, spokesman for the Department of Forestry. "There is a threat" that the fire could approach the city limits today, Wells said.

On Thursday, fire officials were recommending people west of town leave their homes. A sheriff's deputy at a roadblock said he thought most people were leaving. Volunteers and neighbors saw evacuees hauling out possessions, including trailers full of horses and livestock.

The American Red Cross set up an evacuation center at a church in The Dalles, but no one was using it late Thursday. "We think they are staying at friends' houses," said Annadale Rooper, a Red Cross volunteer.

Regional fire officials in Portland made the Sheldon Ridge fire their top priority.

"We were very optimistic," Wells said, that firefighters could contain the blaze early Thursday. Then the area was hit by winds up to 30 mph, blowing flames over containment lines at Lucky Canyon, he said.

Hinatsu said officials wanted to draw additional resources to keep the 3,000-acre fire from spreading. He said they requested air drops of retardant. Portland firefighters in two of the city's fire trucks were among the structural firefighters on the way to assist. Wells said about 200 firefighters were on the line by 8 p.m. Thursday and the number could reach 800 by the middle of the weekend.

"There's some threat that if this thing blows and keeps going, it could drop over into The Dalles' watershed," Hinatsu said. "But that's a long, long way."

Wildland fires threatened homes, cabins and campgrounds throughout the state Thursday, forcing evacuations but causing few property losses. About 10,500 firefighters battled 18 major fires burning across more than 233,000 acres.

The largest, the Winter/Toolbox complex of fires in Lake County, had increased to 115,000 acres by Thursday evening and was still growing, fanned by erratic winds.

In Klamath County, firefighters Wednesday afternoon urged 140 households to evacuate from a subdivision near the town of Sprague River, two hours after a lookout atop Calimus Butte spotted the Skunk fire burning on a ridge.

"It was 12 acres, and then it just went nuts on us," said firefighter Mark Gohlke. "We could barely outrun it with the truck. It started on three acres and then ran out five miles."

Ray and Tammy Miller didn't know of the fire burning on a ridge above their home until a firefighter knocked on the door of their fifth-wheel trailer Wednesday afternoon.

"There was a fire wall up there. You couldn't see nothing but flames," Ray Miller said.

The Skunk fire had expanded to 1,700 acres. Friends, family members, neighbors and strangers headed to Sprague River on Wednesday with pickups and livestock trailers to help evacuate the families threatened by the blaze.

"There were people doing business in town," said Janice Reese, who runs the Sprague River Station store. "By the time they got back and found out what was going on, everything had been moved for them, so that was kind of cool."

A Red Cross evacuation center at the Sprague River Community Center hosted 27 evacuees Wednesday night, and many other families found shelter with relatives and friends. Those families were not expected to return home until today.

To protect 140 homes in the Klamath Forest Estates, firefighters bulldozed a 20-foot-wide fire line and burned back into the main fire to remove fuels. By late Thursday, the fire line was holding in the face of gusting winds.

"We're holding it," Gohlke said. "It keeps trying to run, and we've been pushing it back."

An investigation began Thursday into how an Oregon contract crew became trapped in the Winter portion of the Toolbox fire in Lake County. The 20-person crew deployed fire shelters Wednesday in a safety zone; two suffered minor burns, and they and nine others were transported to a Bend hospital for treatment. All were released.

Twelve homes and a Boy Scout camp at McCaleb Ranch in Josephine County were evacuated in front of the 15,300-acre Florence fire, part of the Biscuit complex of fires, burning out of control in Josephine County with flames as high as 150 feet.

No Scouts were at the camp, and John Swenson, the camp caretaker, said he first thought he'd "hang out and see how it goes" after taking his daughter to stay with his sister Wednesday.

So far, the 12 homes evacuated at nearby Oak Flat had been spared. Gil Knight, a fire information officer, said fire crews had to leave the area to protect themselves Wednesday evening. But he said that on their return Thursday morning, they found all the homes had survived, although two old cabins, a barn and several other structures were destroyed.

Two homes and a privately owned hot springs near the Strawberry Mountain Wilderness south of Prairie City were at risk from a 13,300-acre wildfire Thursday, as flames from the Malheur complex of fires approached.

The Cache Mountain fire near Suttle Lake had grown to 800 acres by Thursday afternoon and was 30 percent contained. The threat to a Methodist Church camp at the lake appeared to diminish, but Geneva Cook, the registrar for the church camps, said 49 elementary school students who earlier were evacuated from the camp had been sent home.

Here's a web alert from The Dalles Chronicle.
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Gorge News and Information
The Dalles Chronicle

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Sheldon Ridge evacuation update:
July 26, 12:22 p.m.

Two hundred seventy homes received official notification for voluntary evacuation last night as fire fighters worked to keep flames of the Sheldon Ridge fire away from homes.

A 7 p.m. community meeting at the Civic Auditorium tonight will update local residents on the status of the fire and evacuation. Dave Wells, lead information officer with Oregon Department of Forestry, said it is not likely people will be able to return to their homes today.

Despite the number of evacuees, the Red Cross center set up at St. Peter’s Parish was deserted this morning. Red Cross Disaster Chairman Annadale Rooper said the Red Cross is open and ready to serve people, but that many evacuees were staying with family and friends, in motor homes in store parking lots around town, and at local hotels.

Evacuees are being encouraged to register with the Red Cross, even if they don’t need shelter or other services, to help family and friends locate them.

“It’s amazing how people volunteer,” said Georgia Lousignont, manager of the parish center.

Local businesses called to donate food and area residents had come by to offer a place at their home and to take in pets, according to Rooper and Lousignont.

The fire staging area at Wahtonka High School was busy this morning as fire crews who worked during the night were coming off the fire line to grab some food and recuperate before they are needed again.

Dirty and tired, D.J. Flamming, a firefighter from Dallas, Ore., with ODF, sat in the Wahtonka gym eating breakfast at around 10 a.m. with others in his crew after pulling a 24-hour shift. He was charged with protecting two cabin structures last night and said the fire came pretty close, but the heat was not that bad.

“It was mostly smokey and I saw a lot of helicopter drops right in front of me. I could feel the water from the drop,” he said.

People may call the fire information center at 296-6961 or 296-4751 for additional updates on evacuation.

Wicks Reservoir treatment plant shut down The last time the city’s water treatment plant went off-line, in 1996, it was because of floods. This time, it’s because of fire.

Citizens are asked to do their part during this rare situation by not watering their lawns.

The Dalles’ Wicks water treatment plant, some eight miles out of town off Mill Creek Road, went off-line Thursday at around 5:30 p.m., said city Water Quality Manager Dave Anderson.

The Sheldon Ridge fire, moving east toward Mill Creek Road, is about one and a half to two miles away from the plant, Anderson said this morning.

The plant was evacuated by 6:30 p.m. last night, after all the systems at the plant were shut down. Then, crews spent the night switching the city’s water supply to three city wells.

Given the lower capacity of the wells as opposed to the reservoir that feeds the plant, “we are very strongly asking for voluntary curtailment and a restriction to outside irrigation,” Anderson said.

When the February 1996 floods shut down the plant, water use was just a third of what it is at this time of year, at the height of the irrigation season. Just two million gallons of water per day were used in February 1996, compared to six million gallons a day right now, Anderson said.

While two of the wells have been put into service in recent summers, one of the wells has not been activated — though it has been regularly monitored and tested — for five or six years, he said.

The three wells can supply the city with water indefinitely, Anderson said. Combined, their daily capacity is around four million gallons, and that’s why people are urged to cut outdoor irrigation.

“We can meet the basic needs of the city pumping those wells basically as long as we need to,” Anderson said.

They can produce the four million gallons a day by running around the clock, but that is “a bit hard on them, so we’d like to see our use get back down under three (million gallons), and we’ve been close to six, so that’s why I say we’re looking for about half the use that we’ve been seeing. And again, that’s achievable because the bulk of the use during the summer is outside irrigation.”

Anderson said that with the wells now in use, water customers may notice a cloudiness or different taste to the water. The well water has more minerals than the surface water provided by the plant.

If residents see cloudiness, “we recommend flushing pipes to see if it clears which it should. It’s just a stirring up of accumulated material inside the pipes.”

While irrigation curtailment is not being actively enforced by the city, it has contacted large irrigators, such as the Northern Wasco County Park and Recreation District, and asked them to halt irrigation. “They’ve been very cooperative to turn off some of the big outdoor irrigation water systems.”

Also, city crews removed chlorine tanks from the water treatment plant. “We did remove the chlorine from the water treatment plant so it would not be any risk of compromising it because of the fire,” Anderson said.

Relay for Life event cancelled The Dalles Area Relay for Life, originally scheduled this weekend at Wahtonka Field, has been cancelled as a result of the Sheldon Ridge Fire.

Fire crews are using Wahtonka Field as a staging area, and Relay organizers decided their event would create too much interference with fire crews.

The Relay is a fundraiser for cancer research.

Earlier, Relay organizers had curtailed the event to a 12-hour period, down from its original 24 hours, but decided to cancel it altogether late this morning as more crews arrived to battle what has become the highest-priority wildfire in the United States.

People who have Relay pledges or donations may turn these in at Columbia River Bank or the Barbecue, using Relay envelopes provided to participants.

A barbecue may be scheduled in a couple of weeks to honor Relay participants; details will be announced as they become available.

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Scanner says more evacuations now ordered on Mill Creek Rd. Winds are really strong this afternoon.

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