News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
News, views and advertising of the Grand Coulee Dam Area
A red "brush truck" at lower left drives through the tall sage below flames climbing the coulee wall, a perspective that emphasizes the scale of the challenge wildland firefighters can face. More photos are on page 2. - Scott Hunter photos
A Fireboss airplane sent in by the Bureau of Land Management drops a load of Banks Lake water on the fire southwest of Pleasant Valley. Three of them made repeated drops in rapid succession before moving on to help fight the Pendell Road fire.
Some 80 firefighters from around the region joined in the suppression effort, bringing 50 trucks being dispatched from the staging area at North Dam.
A group of DNR firefighters prepares to take over for the night and relieve local fire personnel on the Pendell Road fire, which was held to an estimated 350 acres.
Two Fireboss planes turn to scoop more water from nearby Banks Lake before heading back to dump it on the Pleasant Valley fires, a process that took just a few minutes for each cycle.
Fire fighters scrambled to attack five fires that started Sunday afternoon as a slow-moving lightning storm torched brush and grass in Douglas and Grant counties and prompted a "county-wide" call from local fire chiefs.
In Douglas County, a fire at Road 28 Rex was first reported at 4:26 p.m., followed seven minutes later by reports of fires at Pendell Road, two in Grant County in and near Pleasant Valley on the north side of Banks Lake, and another at Barker Canyon at 4:35.
Douglas County Fire District 3's Pendell Road fire in cattle range country north of Crown Point was the least contained. The fires on the north side of the lake had a coulee wall to climb on one side, but early on were moving with a wind toward Pleasant Valley and homes toward the Bridgeport highway in Grand Coulee.
The storm also dropped a lot of water in spots, but not on the fires, noted Corey Allman, chief at District 3.
"The amazing thing to me was the water," said firefighter Dale Rinker at the Pendell Road fire. "When we hit [SR-174] out here ... you couldn't hardly drive the highway, it was coming down so hard. ... It didn't even come to here at all."
Incident Commander and Electric City Volunteer Fire Department Chief Mark Payne and Grand Coulee Volunteer Fire Department Chief Ryan Fish, assessing the situation from their vantage point at North Dam, called for countywide support and for aerial attack.
Police delivered evacuation notices to areas along Pendell Road to Crown Point, along SR 174 in Douglas County and in Pleasant Valley to SR 174. All were lifted by 11 p.m.
With much of the land in danger on federal property, Bureau of Land Management firefighters were dispatched, as were three Fireboss airplanes that made the 55-minute flight from the Tri-Cities, along with an air-attack command plane.
About 80 personnel responded to fight the fires, bringing some 50 trucks and six command vehicles.
They came from Douglas County fire districts 3 and 2; Grant County fire districts 3, 5, 6, 7, 10, 12, and 13; Lincoln County districts 7 and 8; Okanogan Fire District 2 in Elmer City; the Bureau of Reclamation, BLM, and the state Dept. of Natural Resources. Grand Coulee Police, the Douglas County Sheriff's Office, the Grant County Sheriff's Office and National Park Service rangers assisted with evacuations.
By 11 p.m., all but about 25 people and 10 trucks were headed home, said Rick Paris, public information officer for the Grand Coulee department. Those left continued on the fires, monitoring and mopping up, securing lines. Local firefighters were also back on the fires the next day.
On Pendell Road, fire blackened about 350 acres. The Pleasant Valley fires took another 200. About 30 acres burned in Barker Canyon to total about 581 acres, Paris said.
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