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Aw, come on, I protest, these areexpensive leather work boots.
Theyveeven got steel toes. Steel toes? hesays. I once worked a re
over inOregon. Had a new crew. Dont knowwhere they got their boots,
but theyhad steel toes in them. Seven o mymen stepping in a hot
spot, and by thetime they got out o it those steel toeshad roasted
their eet. Crippled all othem.
Neill marches me over to supply andsoon Im outtted like the
reghter:yellow hard hat, goggles, leathergloves, yellow Nomex shirt
(Nomex isa patented re-resistant abric), greencotton trousers,
yellow sleeping bagand a oam ground pad. Ive got a webbelt around
my waist with two plasticcanteens, along with a re shelter.The
shelter deserves special attention.Its used as a last resort, when
thereghter has no route o escape romthe approaching ames and must
there actually pass over his body. Thereghter wraps himsel in the
shelter,a thin metallic blanket, creating aprotective cocoon. Many
reghtershave this piece o gear to thank ortheir lives.
The boots are still a problem. Supplydoesnt carry them because,
o course,real reghters bring their own. But an
impromptu commissary has been setup in the camp by an
entrepreneurialcouple out o Jackson. The store ofersa ew items
otherwise unavailableto the men. Ater trying on severalboots, I
nally select a $95 pair thatlooks suspiciously similar to a $40 set
Irecently owned. Something to do withsupply and demand, I
suspect.
The reghters departed campearly this morning and have beengone
or hours, but Jim Chard, a campsupervisor, ofers to guide me out to
t hesource o this part o the Yellowstoneinerno the Huck Fire. It
started
August 20, when 50-mph winds blew atree across power lines. In
11 days, theHuck Fire has burned 46,581 acres andhas run up a bill
o nearly $2.6 million.Thirty-six crews (a crew consists o 20people)
including 10 Army crews and198 overhead people are ghting it,mostly
to no avail.
Jim and I set of. The trail leads upthe hill and into the
charred orest.
Weve only been walking or a ewminutes when Jim stops, and
kneelingdown, inspects the dusty ootpath.Deer tracks. Ater a ew
more yards, hestops again. Well look at this, he says,resh bear
tracks.
Bear tracks? I ask nervously. Whatkind o bear? I had been warned
earlierto be especially alert or grizzly.
Dont worry, its only a black bear.Theyre small.
The word small can be a relativething. A male black bear can
weigh asmuch as 600 pounds., and althoughaccording to my act book
theyre lesscarnivorous and less aggressive thanthe grizzly, I think
they probablydeserve wide berth. Bears are a subjecto great
interest to me. Every story Iveever been told about a grizz ends
with
and that was it. The bear ate him.So tell me, I ask Jim, just
what do
we do i we meet ace-to-ace with agrizzly?
Well, Ive got this can o bearmace strapped to my waist. Its
activeingredient is cayenne pepper. He grins.
But in my opinion all youd be doingwould be seasoning yoursel
beore thegrizz had you or lunch.
We continue to ollow the trail orover an hour. Eventually we
come upona high-tension powerline pole standingat 45-degree angle.
Its wires aresnapped and rayed, lying inert in the
black ashes covering the ground.This is where it started, Jim
explains.The winds knocked that tree acrossthe lines and they
snapped, sendinga shower o sparks in all directions.
Within a ew seconds we had a orestre.
The wind is malevolent her, theprime mover in the re. The
weatherorecast calls or more, with gusts up t o50 mph.
Jim and I hike back out o thesmoking woods and down to HuckBase.
Im supposed to catch a ride ona Chinook helicopter with two ot
herphotographers: a reelancer out o NewYork and a wire service
shooter romDenver. Were to be given a media tourthat will allow us
to get some overall
aerials. We wait at the helipad or anhour, then receive a radio
messageinorming us the Chinook has beendiverted elsewhere. A Huey
212 willbe sent in its place. Meanwhile, atemperature inversion has
movedin, causing smoke to descent uponthe valley like a brown wool
blanket.Then we hear the Huey is down withmechanical problems, and
now, dueto limited visibility caused by thesmoke, no aircrat will
be ying all
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aternoon. The others decide to returnto Huck Base, but Im in the
middle oa discussion about grizzly bears withScott Cary, a member o
a helitaccrew out o Anchorage, so I decide tohang out at the
helipad or a while.Scott works in the Alaskan bush, andhe knows
about bears. Hes not at allhappy with environmentalists whohave
been demanding that orestservice workers not be allowed to
carrymace since cayenne pepper might beofensive to the animal.
Hell, saysScott, thats the point. Its supposed tobe ofensive.
Apparently a ew o the helicoptercrews have decided to y in spite
othe smoke. As Im talking to Scott, aChinook come in to gather
supplies totake out to the spike camps. Then a BellLong Ranger 206
comes in to pick upa package or the Bailey Spike Camp.Theres an
empty seat, and the pilotreluctantly agrees to let me hitch a
ride.
We arrive at Bailey Spike about 4p.m. The smoke is so thick the
sun isbarely visible. I introduce mysel to IvanCupp, camp
supervisor.
Who gave you permission to comehere? he wants to know.
Dennis Neill said it would be okay.Its only a hal-lie. Neill had
said hewould try to nd a spikecamp willing to put
up with me.Well,okay,
I guess. Welcome to Bailey Spike. Youcan photograph anything you
like. Butlet me caution you to please ask the
Apaches permission beore you taketheir picture. Some o them are
r ealsensitive about being photographed.Follow me and Ill show you
where tolay your bedroll.
Living arrangements or reghtersbreak down to three basic
categories: abase camp, a spike camp and a coyotecamp. A base camp
is semi-civilization.Even though its a temporary setup,there are
showers, a mess tent withthree hot meals a day, a commissary,
telephones the basic necessities andeven a ew minor luxuries.A
spike camp is out in the boonies,
within walking distance o the re,primitive, and even minor
luxuriesare non-existent. Weve got showershere, but only or the
women, explainsCupp. I think thats discriminatory,but unortunately
necessary. Thebiggest danger o a grizzly attack is dueto the scent
o a menstruating woman,so personal hygiene is important orthe
emales.
A coyote camp is nothing more thanan area the reghters have
cleared asae distance rom the ames. There,they throw downtheir
sleepingbags, oten
within severalyards o theblaze.
Darkness arrives early. I check out 12yards o black plastic rom
the supplytent, tie it to a tree, tuck my sleepingbag inside and
crawl into my spike-camp condo. As Im slipping in and outo sleep,
Ivan wakes me to explain Iveailed basic woodsmanship by tyingmy
makeshit tent to a snag a deadtree that will possibly all on me in
themiddle o the night. Im too tired to getup to redo my sleeping
arrangements.Ivan is disgusted with my ignorant cityways but
apparently decides not topress the point. Listen, Ivan lectures,i
you hear three short blasts on the air
horn, grab your gear and get down tothe meadow as quick as you
can. Threeblasts means were either about to beoverrun by the re or
weve got a grizzlyin camp.
I sleep tully. At odd intervals, treeson the hillside just
across the meadowcandle, bursting into ames with aloud aroosh! and
lighting up the sky.
At 5 a.m., I awaken to someoneyelling Aiyiyi! Come on! Lets get
it!The next thing I notice is my nose isrozen. The thing about
trying to sleepon the ground at 7,000 eet is it can beabove 90
degrees in the evening whenyou go to sleep and below reezing inthe
morning when you wake up.
The thermometer reads 30. Istumble out o my sleeping bag, pull
on
my boots andstagger over tothe hugeThe smoke or the orest
re is so thick everyone iscoughing, spitting on theground. I ask
Ivan whatthe long-term efects obreathing all this smoke are.Well,
they say its equivalentto smoking two packs a day.
Yellowstone frefghters on a mission
Working the daily grind
Yellowstone Firefghters On a Mission
It has been a long day or these frefghters
