While a second wave of Ontario firefighters are battling wildfires in Montana and a third wave was due to land there last night, the first contingent of the firefighters to help out in the U.S. are back here for a rest.
For the first time ever, Ontario firefighters have joined forces with firefighters from across the globe helping U.S. crews battle hundreds of thousands of acres of forest that is so dry it is burning at speeds of 150 feet a minute.
“It’s the driest I’ve ever seen any fuel before. Their average rainfall is eight inches a year, I told them that sometimes we get that in a day,” said MNR crew chief Bill Payne, who returned here yesterday morning after spending 18 days “down south.”
The fire fighting principals and techniques were the same but the number of fires and the geography made the job fairly different.
“It was a little bit different, the terrain and topography itself is what got everybody. There were elevations that would drop 11,000 feet,” said Payne.
“The first hill I walked up my legs were just wobbling,” he added.
The crews were forced to quickly adapt to the atmosphere, high temperatures and steep climbs.
“We found it took a couple of days to get used to the thin air,” said crew boss Amy Welsh who also just returned from Montana.
A number of differences affected the fire-fighting in Montana. Water was a very sought-after commodity for the crews compared to battling fires in Northwestern Ontario where there is usually a nearby lake or stream.
“The fuel would be from grassland to large trees. There’s not much there for water so we used lots of pumper trucks,” explained Payne.
With temperatures averaging in the low 30s the fires were often too powerful to work with by the afternoon and crews would be evacuated to build fire protection lines ahead of the flames. The firefighters set out at six a.m. every morning and worked digging trenches and putting up lines to prevent the fires from burning buildings–even entire towns.
“For structural protection they were going to focus on bigger towns,” explained Payne.
Smaller villages were evacuated and left behind he explained.
The local crew spent one stint of 21 hours managing an eight-mile burnout. A few of the Rainy River firefighters were fighting the first fires of their career but even the experienced ones faced a few very unfamiliar challenges.
“Something I never experienced before was rattlers and black widow spiders . . . a guy in another camp got bit,” said Payne.
“And there’s the brown recluse [spider] it’s more venomous and there’s no anti-venom,” he added.
Along with Canadian and U.S. crew members German, Australian, New Zealand, Philipino and Mexican firefighters were in Montana battling the blazes.
“Everyone in Montana was super, super friendly. One town had ‘kiss a Canadian’ week,” noted Payne.
For Payne and other returning crew members there is a good chance they will be sent back for a second chance to battle the Montana wildfires.
“Their fire season usually starts in the middle of August,” said Payne. “Their pretty worried, they’re comparing this year to 1910 when a lot of lives were lost.”
As they switched planes on the way up from Montana, the Fort Frances crew waved to a cheerful bunch of fellow firefighters headed down to face the still-raging infernos there.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
