Lightning strikes fire into Sisters wilderness

A lightning strike at about 4 p.m. sparked the first major wilderness wildfire of the season on Monday, July 28.

"Black Butte (lookout) picked it up right away. It was a hot strike that went right to a large column (of smoke), said Mark Rapp, who was incident commander Monday night.

Rapp said there was no moisture associated with the thunder storm, which allowed the lightning to cause immediate ignition.

The fire, clearly visible from Sisters, is on the north side of Black Crater, about one-half mile southeast of Windy Point on the Mckenzie Highway. It's about two-and-a-half miles northeast of the Pacific Crest Trail into Matthew Lakes.

On Tuesday morning, the fire was still estimated at 25 acres.

The Forest Service hit the fire on Monday with 95 personnel, including smoke jumpers, and dumped four aircraft loads of retardent. After dark, the number of firefighters was reduced to 30, and increased again to 90 on Tuesday morning.

On Monday the fire was fanned by intermittent winds at five miles an hour out of the north. While these are not high winds, they were fanning the fire in the upslope direction.

"Slope and wind working together increased the intensity. Fuels are also a big problem up there. There is extremely heavy down material. It is a decadent stand that probably hasn't seen fire in a hundred years," said Rapp.

The area is in the three Sisters Wilderness. This precludes the use of heavy equipment such as bulldozers, although the steep slopes themselves may have made dozer operation hazardous, according to Rapp.

To fight the fire, the forest Service was "running a pump show" from Highway 242. Four water tenders were feeding several water tanks on the highway, with pumps sending the water up the hill in stages to the fire.

Still, the fire burned hot and fast, with "a lot of torching and spotting going on," said Rapp. On Tuesday, there was a line around the main fire, but there was a two acre spot fire about half mile away from the main blaze.

"We expect to find several more spots out on the east flank of the fire. Darkness fell before we could find all those. Hopefully we'll find them in a timely manner," said Rapp.

He hoped to have the fire out in three days.

Weather on Tuesday was supposed to have temperatures in the 80s, with low humidity and light winds, but more thunder storms are expected through the end of the week.