Rush Creek Fire
Location: 20 miles E of Yellow Pine, Valley Co., ID
Specific Location: Payette NF, Rainbow Peak area, Lat 44° 59´ 10″ Lon 114° 59´ 17″
Date of Origin: 07/15/2008
Cause: unknown
Situation as of 08/14/08 11:30 AM
The Rush Creek Fire has been declared a part of the Westy WFU Fire [here]
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Situation as of 08/06/08 4:45 PM
Total Personnel: 3
Size: 1,435 acres
Containment: 0%
Est date of containment: 10/15/2008
Overhead Team Name: Rod Dines. McCoy is ICT3. Payette Fire Manager is Sam Hescock. It is unclear whether any of these individuals are anywhere near the fire. Planned actions are to monitor by air.
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Situation as of 08/02/08 4:45 PM
Total Personnel: 3
Size: 1,415 acres
Containment: 0%
This fire is a non-suppression suppression fire. The Payette NF does not want to use the designation “WFU” because of it’s association with Let It Burn. So they call fires like the Rush Creek Fire “suppression” fires even though there is zero effort expended to contain or control them. In this manner they can claim that suppression fires overwhelmed their capabilities, which is partially true, since their capabilities are nil.
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Situation as of 07/31/08 5:30 PM
Total Personnel: 2
Size: 350 acres
Containment: 0%
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Situation as of 07/30/08 7:00 PM
Total Personnel: 1
Size: 225 acres
Containment: 0%
Est date of containment: 10/15/08
Costs to date: not reported
Overhead Team Name: Sam Hescock
Fire was quiet with just a couple of smokes for the past week, but today fire activity picked up. Active ground fire on the southern flank with individual torching.
Planned Actions: none
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Situation as of 07/29/08 9:00 AM
Total Personnel: not reported
Size: not reported
Maximum Manageable Area: not reported
Est date of containment: 10/15/08
Costs to date: not reported
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Situation as of 07/23/08 9:00 AM
Total Personnel: not reported
Size: not reported
Maximum Manageable Area: not reported
Est date of containment: not reported
Costs to date: not reported
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Situation as of 07/22/08 6:00 AM
Total Personnel: 0
Size: 200 acres
Percent Contained: 0%
This may seem like an innocuous fire, but last year the Payette NF decided to let innocuous fires burn until 800,000 acres were incinerated.
No staffing on the Rush Creek Fire, no attempt to contain, control, or extinguish. Burn, baby, burn is business as usual on the radical and lawless Payette. This blurb was spit up on the Payette NF website:
McCall, ID (July 18, 2008) – The Krassel Ranger District is currently managing the 30 [sic] acre Rush Creek Fire in the Frank Church – River of No Return Wilderness. The fire is located in the Rush Creek area near Shellrock Creek in a remote area characterized by steep slopes and rocky terrain and is not threatening property or people [just forests, wildlife, watershed, and other resource values].
The cause of the fire is unknown [not a clue]. It began on July 15 and is burning in heavy timber [read forest]. Currently, the fire is staying on the ground and moving slowly through the forest [until it blew up to 200 acres and is rapidly growing]. The fire was at 20 acres when it was discovered and grew to an estimated 30-40 acres, due in part to an increase in wind [and thar she blows. Whoopsie daisy, another bonehead bad fire behavior prediction]. Thunderstorms are expected to bring wind and rain today and tomorrow but temperatures are predicted to bring hotter and drier conditions over the weekend.
The fire is being closely monitored via over flights by fire staff [no firefighter is going near it]. Fire Management Staff and Forest leadership are monitoring the fire’s progression and will implement point protection if values become threatened [that would be never, since the Payette has no values]. Fire behavior modeling is also being utilized to help predict the progression and spread of the fire across the landscape [even though the models are funky and wrong].
The Rush Creek Fire is being managed and not immediately suppressed because of its location, the potential for resource benefits associated with fire and the lack of any threat to people or property [WHAT GODDAMN RESOURCE BENEFITS????????????????]. Not suppressing the fire also does not put firefighters at risk unnecessarily [just the forests, wildlife, watersheds, etc.] Firefighter and public safety are priorities as fire managers consider the array of fire management tools available to them.
This pro-holocauster government babble and horrific abrogation of responsibility is likely to lead to another megafire at the cost of tens of $millions and damages in the hundreds of $millions. They got away with it last year (no Payette person was prosecuted or jailed for burning 1,250 square miles of public forest).
Please call the Payette National Forest at (208) 634-0700 to express your displeasure.
by Heather
I hope you are correct and they try to stop this fire. They sure could have started when it was 10 acres, though.
The Let It Burn crowd on the Payette did SO MUCH DAMAGE to forests last year that it boggles the mind. Their burning led to the single largest contiguous forest fire in US history and left a wasteland charred earth landscape 90 miles long.
Those nuts celebrated their destruction! They are still breaking their arms patting themselves on the back for incinerating priceless, heritage forests, fouling thousands of miles of creeks and rivers, setting off an erosion event that will last for a decade or more, destroying wildlife habitat across the whole of central Idaho, and generally acting like the Adolf Hitlers of forestry.
Will Susie fight this fire or will she hide under her desk again. Is Sammy Holocaust in charge again? How much does the USFS really hate forests with passion? It all remains to be seen.
Help is on the way. On 7/22 Helicopter Transport Inc. was contracted to deploy a Helicopter team to Salmon Idaho. I know this because my man is the fuel truck driver.