Resort fighting Cascade fire with snowmaking equipment

By Laura Tode of Montana Lee Newspapers - 07/29/2008

Smoke from the Cascade fire rises from the drainage of the West Fork of Rock Creek. West Fork Road was closed early Sunday near Silver Run Road. PAUL RUHTER/Gazette Staff

RED LODGE — Red Lodge Mountain Resort is putting its snowmaking equipment to use in hopes of protecting the ski hill from the Cascade fire, burning less than two miles away in the West Fork of Rock Creek.

Ten guns, capable of spraying 85 gallons of water a minute are soaking the ground around chair lift terminals, motor rooms and the resort’s two lodges. The guns draw water from ponds near the top of the mountain.

“It looks like we’re making snow, but we’re just blowing water,” said Rob Ringer, general manager of the Red Lodge Mountain Resort.

The fire started about 11 miles west of Red Lodge Saturday, and by Monday had burned more than 5,800 acres of timber as well as four summer homes and an outbuilding at the historic Camp Senia.

The owner of one, Jim Moore, said his cabin was closest to where the fire began Saturday.

“It was doomed from the beginning,” he said. “I’m sure it was in ashes before the firetrucks even hit the Forest Service boundary.” Moore said he is now concerned about his primary residence in town.

Monday, Gov. Brian Schweitzer was briefed by incident commanders and flew over the burn area.

Viewed from the air, pillows of dark smoke piled up to the ridgeline on either side of the canyon. Flames could be seen shooting skyward as tree crowns were engulfed. Where the blaze had already passed, all that remained were the blackened skeletons of thousands of trees.

Schweitzer said the Cascade fire was the most dangerous to hit the state so far this year. He called it a top priority.

“I’d like to limit people’s expectations,” he said. “Not to be a pessimist, but if you get 25 to 35 mph winds, you’re not going to be putting people in front of it.” The rugged canyon has made firefighting difficult, and there has been no way to contain the fire, Red Lodge Fire Chief Tom Kuntz said.

“The way the column is cranking up right now, it’s going to be 6,000-some (acres) by tomorrow morning, if not more,” said Jeff Gildehaus, a fire information officer with the U.S. Forest Service.

Efforts are focused on protecting structures, including Red Lodge Mountain Resort and homes that lay on the West Fork Road between the fire and town.

“My biggest fear all winter is ‘will it snow?’ and my biggest fear all summer is ‘is there going to be a fire?’ This is my worst fear,” Ringer said.

Work is under way to cut fire lines with a bulldozer along the ridge near the resort to stop the fire should it make a run at the ski hill, said Greg Poncin, the deputy incident commander for the Type I Northern Rockies Management Team. Additional fire lines are planned and officials may start back burns if conditions are right, he said.

The fire is burning in dense timber, criss-crossed with blown-down trees from a wind storm last November. Winds usually howl down the canyon, and although winds were calm Sunday night and Monday, fire officials said they are expecting wind gusts up to 25-miles-per-hour in the next few days, which would cause the fire to blow up.

“The fire will be weather-driven,” Poncin said. “It has the potential to move very quickly down this canyon.” Three helicopters dropped water on the fire Monday. However, fire managers said an air attack is limited by visibility, and large tankers that drop fire retardant cannot safely maneuver in the steep-walled canyon.

Evacuation orders, which went into effect Sunday, remain in place, but no new evacuations were ordered Monday. Homes located above the Timbercrest Girl Scout Camp and Silver Run, Lamb Estates and Mountain Brook subdivisions - all on West Fork Road - were evacuated. No campers were at the Girl Scout camp.

Though not directly in the path of the blaze, about 90 homes in the Grizzly Peaks Subdivision was also evacuated. The subdivision has only one entrance/exit and the homes are situated in dense timber, Gildehaus said. An emergency evacuation of Grizzly Peaks would be risky, he said.

Kuntz warned that if the fire blows out of the canyon, his crews might not be able to protect the subdivision.

“The worst-case scenario is a real possibility. And in the worst-case scenario, we can’t put anybody on it in there,” he said.

Despite several cars left at trailheads in the area of the fire, the Forest Service said there are no known hikers or campers left in the back country.

“There’s nobody there that we know of,” Gildehaus said. “Nobody’s been waving their arms.” Gildehaus said the size of the area makes it difficult to check every crack, but fire crews have swept from the Red Lodge Plateau to East Rosebud and from Lake Fork to Highway 212.

Gildehaus said vehicle retrieval is in progress for a man who was evacuated while hiking in West Fork and had to leave his truck behind. The man contacted the Forest Service and described his truck, allowing officials to positively identify it and make a plan to drive it out.

Other vehicles left at trailheads or campgrounds have not yet been identified by owners, Gildehaus said.

The Montana Department of Environmental Quality on Monday classified the air quality in the Red Lodge area as “unhealthy.” The elderly, smokers, children and people with respiratory or heart diseases are advised to stay indoors, limit direct exposure with the smoke and avoid physical exertion.

The Red Lodge Area Chamber of Commerce is looking for volunteers to staff a phone bank that will be as the official contact point for questions about the fire. It is expected to be up and running today, Beth Hutchinson, executive director of the Red Lodge Area Chamber of Commerce, said the phone bank will be at the Carbon County fairgrounds in Red Lodge. A phone number for the call center will be established as soon as the phones are installed. People should call the Red Lodge Area Chamber of Commerce at 406-446-1718 for information in the meantime, she said.

The center will have the capacity for 28 phones. Volunteer shifts will be four hours each, with three shifts each day from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

In the event that the town of Red Lodge must be evacuated, residents will be notified by either a loud, continuous siren or a series of repeated siren blasts, Hutchinson said. MetraPark in Billings would host residents forced from the town, she said.

Volunteer firefighters from Red Lodge and surrounding fire districts stayed at Camp Senia late into the night Saturday, and although four cabins were lost, 20 were spared.

“The way the fire was going, pretty much everybody thought those homes wouldn’t be saved,” Kuntz said.

Sharon Butler found out Monday her family’s summer home was still standing. She and her family were gone Saturday when the fire started and feared the worst until they got word from fire officials that their cabin was not touched.

The Butlers, who live in Kentucky, spend two months every summer at their cabin in Camp Senia, which has been in Sharon’s husband Ben’s family for almost 50 years.

“Every year, we count the days - the months - until we can get out here. It’s so wonderful,” Butler said.

John and Shirley Overton live in Grizzly Peaks and were evacuated during the Willie fire two years ago. Their past experience prepared them for Sunday’s evacuation, and they ended up taking fewer items this time, packing only a single truckload.

“There are things you know you can’t replace and the rest of it is just stuff,” Overton said.

In the Tipi Village subdivision, about five miles from the fire, homeowner Kyle Tompkins was ready Monday for a quick evacuation if the blaze moved his way.

“I did wet the grass a little bit, but what can you do?” asked Tompkins, 47, who works from a home office. “If it’s time, there’s not much a garden hose is going to do.” Tompkins said he and others in Tipi Village had expected that a major fire in the mountains above their homes was “just a matter of time.” Associated Press reporter Matthew Brown and Gazette reporter Zach Benoit contributed to this story.

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