We always have fires during harvest so traveling is not an option during this time of year. There's no way around it. The fields are dry, as there is rarely rain in July and August in our county, so it takes almost nothing to start a fire. A lightning strike, a hot exhaust or catalytic converter, a combine, a cigarette, a camp stove, or an arson. In this case, it was a camp stove that blew off a table near the mouth of the Deschutes River.
The winds had already been ridiculous for this time of year. Thirty miles per hour was beginning to look like normal. I think the winds were 20+ on the night of July 13th, 2023. The phone alarm started going off just as I had served dinner. We wolfed down our food. We all have tractors hooked up to discs and fire wagons/pickups with water and hoes and shovels. I pulled on my boots and raced for the pickup.
We lived about 15 miles away. There must have been 30 rigs already at the fire when we arrived. Our route took us above the action, and there wasn't much to do at that point but watch. The farmer harvesting nearby had already disked a wide fire line and stopped the fire — the same place he had stopped the substation fire four years before. There must have been 100 of us by that time, and the fire was being kept down in the canyon. Every time it surged over the edge, the farmers beat it back.
It was night, so we didn't have any water from airplanes. I had flown infrared over forest fires before Northwest Airlines hired me, so watching tankers fascinates me. Maybe by morning we could get so help from the air, but tonight it was just ground crews. It's hot and dangerous work, and you don't want to be under power lines fighting a fire unless you have a death wish.
After a few hours we headed home. I was curious about a building we passed on the way in. My husband said it was an old VOR station. I vaguely remember using it for guidance years ago, but I had no idea the base of the building was still there. The "bowling pin" portion was gone.
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