Oregon wildfires threatening homes
CAVE JUNCTION, Ore. (AP) – Using a fire hose to douse the grass beside his house, Bob Bell swore to stay until the bitter end as a massive wildfire loomed nearby. “Twenty-five years ago, I had a home burn in the … Angeles National Forest, and I’m not going to have that happen again,” Bell said Wednesday. “I’ve got a pond in back that’s seven feet deep, and I’m going to jump in it,” if the fire comes.
Bell and thousands of other residents in southwestern Oregon’s Illinois Valley have been on edge in recent days as they await word on a pair of wildfires covering 187,000 acres that have become a top priority in the nation’s firefighting effort.
Across Oregon on Thursday, about 13,000 firefighters were battling about 15 major wildfires burning more than 423,000 acres.
Pickup trucks and trailers loaded with household goods have been trickling out of the Illinois Valley since the fires exploded Sunday, sending up a 30,000-foot plume of smoke.
But the Josephine County Sheriff’s Department said only about 400 of the valley’s 17,000 residents had registered with the Red Cross as having left the area. About 100 more have notified the police of their intent to leave.
“We’re going to stay here until they tell us it’s time to get out,” high school principal Ron Brood said at his home outside Selma. “Then I’ll turn on the sprinklers on the perimeter and get out.”
Strong winds were expected out of the north Thursday, pushing closer the 150,000-acre Florence and the 37,000-acre Sour Biscuit fires.
cuit Complex. They were last reported about two miles apart.
Firefighters’ strategy Thursday was to protect several small towns by torching off backfires along a 30-mile fire line of logging roads and bulldozer cuts. Fire commanders hope favorable wind will blow the fires set on purpose toward the main conflagration, depriving it of unburned fuel.
Crews were working to clear brush and volatile landscaping to improve their chances of protecting homes, said Tim Birr, spokesman for the Oregon State Fire Marshal’s Office.
“If it can help keep the fire from getting to my house, more power to them,” Brood said as firefighters chain-sawed trees in his backyard.
Elsewhere in the West:
– A wildfire that may have been sparked by a National Guard helicopter was burning across 20,000 acres of dry brush and trees in San Diego County, Calif. The fire, which has destroyed nine homes and killed four wolves at a wildlife center near Julian, was about 15 percent contained Thursday morning.
– Firefighters battling a 3,300-acre blaze in Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado dug containment lines and were helped by at least two air tankers, five helicopters and 30 engines. Archaeologists accompanied crews to prevent damage to 25,000 sites left by the ancestral Pueblo Indians. The park remained closed, and the fire was about 5 percent contained.
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On the Net:
National Interagency Fire Center: http://www.nifc.gov/
Florence/Sour Biscuit Fires website:
http://www.pnw-team2.com/florence
ndex.html