Sisters dodged lightning fires

Sisters area residents can be forgiven if they get a little anxious when the big, black thunderheads build on the southern horizon.

We know what a single lightning strike can do. Lightning caused the Cache Mountain Fire in 2002, a blaze that marched downslope to destroy two homes at Black Butte Ranch. Lightning kindled two separate blazes that started 15 miles apart, only to burn together into the destructive 90,000 acre B&B Complex Fire in 2003.

A bolt from the sky struck a tree on Black Crater and sparked a 9,000-acre blaze that forced the evacuation of Crossroads and Tollgate just last summer.

So when forecasters called for dry lightning and the sky grew black last Thursday, local folks crossed their fingers and hoped Sisters was not in for another bout with wildfire.

The thunder and lightning came, with thousands of strikes showering down around Camp Sherman, across Green Ridge and in an arc to the north.

But with the lightning came torrential rain that drenched anyone caught on the street. No one complained; the rain felt like a blessing.

Fire crews from the Forest Service, Oregon Department of Forestry and the Bureau of Land Management were poised all across the region, ready to chase down fires and reports of smoke.

Sisters did get fires, but they were small and quickly attacked and doused.

According to Sisters Ranger District fire battalion chief Jinny Pitman, there were about nine small fires scattered across the Sisters area, a couple of them in the vicinity of Stevens Canyon, others in the wilderness to the west.

Initial attack crews, which included engines, hand crews and smokejumpers, put lines around several small fires and investigated multiple reports of smoke in the Sisters area.

One significant fire continues to burn in the Metolius River Canyon to the north of Camp Sherman on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation side of the river.

The Metolius Bench Fire is the largest of several lightning-sparked blazes on the Warm Springs Reservation and it was to be turned over to a Type II Emergency Management Team on Monday.

The fire had grown to 450 acres by Sunday night.

Locally, threatened thunderstorms did not materialize on Friday and the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show went forward without looming smoke clouds - though wisps could be detected to the north.

Sisters isn't out of the woods yet.

A key concern for firefighters is the potential for "sleepers" - tiny blazes that smolder undetected in dead trees for days, then burst into full-fledged fires. Such sleepers sparked the massive B&B Fire that forced evacuation of Camp Sherman twice in the late summer of 2003.

Battalion commander Pitman told The Nugget that air patrol will search for signs of a sleeper outbreak.

"We'll have recon - fixed wing and helicopters - in the air," she said.

Pitman said the pilots are issued maps of the area generated by radar recording of lightning strikes. Areas that have had strikes will be patrolled in a grid for several days after the thunderstorm cells move through.

Author Bio

Jim Cornelius, Editor in Chief

Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.

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