Spring Gulch Firefighters
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June 14, 2016
As I made my way to Decker’s this morning, I noticed about 20 or so people that seemed to be resting around the Decker’s Resort businesses, so I approached a few of the friendly folks and found out that they were a group of 20 firefighters that had just come off the Spring Gulch fire. The Spring Gulch Fire burned 11.9 acres in the Pike National Forest about three miles south of Decker’s on Monday. It was fully contained just a few hours later. The fire was on federal land in Douglas County. Wild-land firefighting crews and helicopter support battled the fire along with the Douglas County Wildfire Mitigation Crew and Douglas County Sheriff Wild land Fire Hand-crew. The crew I met and spoke with this morning was made up of 4 inter-agency groups consisting of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), National Forest Service, and the National Park Service (NPS). I spoke with their Team Leader, Mark Finnegan, Crew Boss Trainer. Mark is a full-time firefighter working out of the Green River Emergency Crew, Wyoming High Desert Emergency Crew. He and his crew also cover emergency situations that occur in other western National Parks such as Dinosour Ridge in Vernal, Utah. This inter-agency group is made up of firefighters from Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Utah and Kansas. They are always on stand-by and typically out for 14 day deployments. He told me that he has been leading this courageous group of men and women for the last four days, while working in extreme temperatures and tough terrain, to contain the fire that was mostly timber, grass, and slash. Slash is a term used to describe logs that are remaining on the ground from previous fires or other natural occurrences. Speaking on behalf of the residents and visitors to the South Platte Valley, I would like to personally thank Mark and his crew for quickly coming to the aid of our community. I’ve been fortunate to have been living in this valley for the last couple of years when the fire danger has been relatively low, but as the summer progresses, it appears that we are getting drier and drier as the summer days go by. With the high winds and dry conditions, wildfires can ignite with the smallest of sparks, so please keep campfires in designated fire rings, extinguish all fires by pouring water on the fire until the coals or wood is cool to the touch and do not throw cigarette butts out of your automobile window. I hope you enjoy the update on the Spring Gulch fire and here’s a picture of the wonderful group of firefighters from this morning. Have a great day!
Chris
