Hat Creek Complex

August 2nd marks the second fire call of the season for Salt Lake 2. The Hat Creek Complex was in the North Western part of the Lassen National Forest. There were three fires on the complex totaling over 11,000 acres. The first two days were spent securing and mopping up on the Brown fire. The 3rd day was a little more eventful with a burn operation that went underway on the Sugarloaf fire. Matt Burchett also came out and acted as the Strike Team Leader for our division while Riley Pilgram was our Firing Boss. The next day was spent mopping up everything we had burned. Sadly we were demobed the next morning as the fires were mostly contained. It was a long 14 hour drive home with a night in Elko on the way.

Trailer 1 and Redrock Fire

On July 17th, 2009, Salt Lake 1 and 2 got their first dispatch a full month and a half into the fire season! The Trailer 1 and Red Rock fires were believed to be started at 2:13 p.m. July 15 by a trailer being towed with a flat tire on U.S. 395 along the border of CA and NV. Both crews got 5 days out of the fires, with the fires totaling over 12,000 acres. The big news of the fire was an infection of Norovirus spreading across camp. Believed to be carried in the water, the virus infected 10 members from Crew 2 but Crew 1 managed to get out with no infections. After the crews got home, all personnel on the fires were quarantined for four days.

Coldwater Ranch Project 1

The entire Wildland Bureau just returned from a 3 day project work extravaganza at the Coldwater Ranch near Hyrum, Utah. The project consisted of cutting and piling old logging slash for burning this fall. We endured one night of rain and enjoyed our first 2009 Meier's catering experience.

2009 Annual Training

Another successful two week training period. Nearly all crewmembers made it through red card, saw class, urban interface, land navigation, radios, incident command system, and leadership classes. Only a few overuse injuries (nothing that can't be cured with a little or a lot of ibuprofin and some weekend couch time), no problems passing the state tests, and our red cards arrived in Magna friday afternoon.

So all Wildland Resources will be available nationally on monday morning, June 1st, at 0600. Looks like the "sit report" is slowly starting to come alive but we have an overnight project lined up for next week near Hardware Ranch.

Spring Rx Burn

See the photo album for photos from Justin Shaak and Shaun Mullins' spring prescribed burn spectacular in Wisconsin and Missouri.

Quadrennial Fire Review

See NIFC website for news and reports on the upcoming fire season. Here are the results of the quadrennial fire review
http://www.nifc.gov/QFR/index.htm

Sunday Fun Run

2009 Salt Lake 2 "Sunday Fun Run" series will commence this sunday at 0830 at Sugarhouse park. Call Edward or Rob with questions or for more details.

Full Time

Former Crew 1 Sawyer Jesse Carpenter starts his career as a full time structural firefighter today. Congratulations, Jesse. He is so fit he needed a doctor's note to come to work because his resting heart rate is so low.

Preseason Training

After a quick morning workout Nate realized he had torn the skin off his hands doing hanging ladder climbs. I had to tape his hands up so he could ride his bike for an hour later that day.

What are you doing to get ready for the season?

2009 Interviews

The Wildland Bureau is no longer accepting applications for the 2009 fire season. We had a record number of applicants this year and appreciate everyone's interest. We are looking forward to seeing the applicants at the qualifying run this weekend. Those individuals that pass the run will be invited to an interview next week.

At this time we do not know how many people we will need to hire. This number depends upon returning firefighters and several other factors.

We have ongoing training scheduled throughout the spring for various personnel. We anticipate starting preseason training for everyone sometime in the middle of May.