Elk Fire Prompts Evacuations of Town’s Northern Subdivisions

Faced with flood last month and continuing wildfire concern — and as yet no Biblical prospect of swarms of locusts — Lake City residents and visitors continue to make the best of an at-times challenging situation in the wake of the Elk Fire. The southern boundary of the wildfire is now estimated to be roughly a mile and a half to the north/northwest of Lake City at Larson Creek.
As of mid-week this week and following 0.2” rain which dampened grass and brush and slowed the growth of the fire, the expanded fire now static encompassing a total of 7,404.8 acres with 35 percent containment. Containment refers to the portion of the fireline reasonably considered to be controlled, with 35 percent of the fire’s perimeter line, largely to the northwest and northern Alpine Plateau Road.
Notable are the residents of 42 homes and associated structures to the immediate north of Lake City in San Juan Springs and San Juan Hills Subdivision on the west side of Highway 149 who evacuated from their homes last Friday, August 7,

due to southerly expansion of the Elk Fire.
Highly populated San Juan Springs and San Juan Hills are at the southern end of Zone HNS-E003A which includes addresses on San Juan Springs Drive, Rocky Springs Drive, Silver Springs Drive, Elk Road, Deer Trail, and Eagle Drive, the evacuation zone extending northward on the west side of Highway 149 past Valley View and Lake Fork Hunting & Fishing to the Independence Gulch Trailhead in Lake Fork Canyon.
Residents of those subdivisions have found shelter at other locations, some temporarily occupying vacant homes elsewhere in Lake City in Riverside Estates or further up valley above Lake San Cristobal, while some have temporarily found new addresses further afield at hotels in Gunnison, Almont, Montrose, and Grand Junction.
Hinsdale County Emergency Manager keeps constantly apprised of the fire situation and on Wednesday and Thursday mornings this week was joined by Hinsdale County Sheriff Denim Starnes and Undersheriff Jordan Kaminski at meetings with members of the Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team to review Lake Fork Valley evacuation status. At Wednesday morning’s meeting, it was concluded not to change evacuation status but to meet again — with the possibility of possibly relaxing the home exit requirement on Thursday.
Hinsdale County’s goal, as expressed in a communique from County Administrator Sandy Hines on Wednesday, “is to return those who have evacuated back to their homes safely and reduce evacuation statuses as soon as possible.”
“However,” Hines continues, “the County team does not want to make a decision to change evacuation status prematurely. The plan is to have families to be able to return to their homes and stay there.”
Paradoxical in evaluating evacuation zones is pre-planning in the event rains on burn scars in the high country might also result in destructive mud and debris flows at lower elevations.
A significant factor in whether the north Lake City evac-uation zone will be lessened is completion of a construction of a new fireline — which began Wednesday — at the southeast edge of the fire above San Juan Springs Subdivision and Town of Lake City. The new fireline is being built with aid of bulldozer and utilizing a high trained hot shot crew specializing in fireline construction in rugged terrain. Hinsdale County E003A and HNS-

_{Reassuring speakers at last Friday night’s public meeting on the Elk Fire, top to bottom at left, were Gunnison National Forest Administrator Megan Eno, Rocky Mountain Team 1 Operations Section Chief Travis Lipp, Hinsdale Emergency Manager Phil Graham, and Incident Commander Austin Baker; below, Travis Lipp with fire map and meeting attendees.}

E002 — latter a large mostly unpopulated swath surrounding the fire footprint to the west in Uncompahgre Wilderness Area — remain in evacuation mode as of press time.
Neighboring zones north of Lake City to both the east and west of Highway 149 remain in the yellow “get set to evacuate” category, including HNS-E003B (north side of Pete’s Lake and areas to the north of the Country Store, including Riverside Estates), Town of Lake City and lower Henson Creek (HNS-E016), San Juan Ranch Estates (HNS-E004), HNS-E005, west side Highway 149 from Independence Gulch Trailhead to county line, including Randy and Alena Haskell, and Jeff Moler; and HNS-E006, east side of Highway 149 from Valley View Ranch to county line.
Teams overseeing the Elk Fire started last month last month with Wyoming Type 2 and Northwest Team 8, and were followed in 14-day increments this month by Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team 1, Justin Conrad Commander, which was succeeded by Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team 2, Rodney Redinger and Alan Sinclair Incident Commanders, effective 7 a.m. Sunday, August 9.
Each of the teams build on successes set in place by prior teams working within a grid work in which Uncompahgre Wilderness and public lands to the west of the Elk Fire are classified Division M, Divisions Alpha and X-Ray to the east of Highway 149, and Division G (for Golf) to the south surrounding Town of Lake City.
The new fireline now under construction for protection of Town of Lake City and San Juan Springs Subdivision, for instance, is under the purview of a hot shot crew working in Division G.
On the cusp of the change over from Rocky Mountain Team 1 to Rocky Mountain Team 2 last Saturday, an especially insightful public meeting was held in the gymnasium at Lake City Community School Friday evening, August 7.

A recurrent theme at the meeting and open forum which followed was the need for “patience” and that it is likely some degree of smoke will continue for the foreseeable future until the smoldering fire is finally put out by snow.
In his fire behavior report, Brandon Fischer told the capacity audience “snow needs to fly really soon.” He referred to recent intermittent rainfall as a “blip in the radar” in terms of making up for historically low snowpack, in the 10 to 20 percent range last winter and spring. Snowpack effectively went off the ground March 1 as compared to traditional May/June, the lack of spring moisture then allowing forest undergrowth and both small and large diameter timber to slowly dry out and become combustible.
Even with occasional rain , according to Fire Behavior Specialist Fischer, for larger dimension timber, “it takes a long time to dry out and a long time to regain moisture.”
A continuation of the wildfire may be expected during traditionally dry late August into September, Fischer said, and until snow flies.
Fischer’s sentiments were echoed by Rocky Mountain Team 1’s Operations Section Chief Travis Lipp who drew Lake City audience applause in stating “you fellows have a hell of a place to live.” Lipp expressed confidence in patiently allowing the wildfire to slowly move to the south and east, “we’re prepared and equipment is in place.”
Ultimately, however, Lipp said “expect the fire to continue until snow flies and Mother Nature puts it out.”
In reference to the Elk Fire’s progression, Lipp said dense stands of mixed conifer, much of it standing and fallen dead beetle kill, combined with aspen and mountain juniper, are burning at higher elevation. The fire, however, diminishes at lower, rockier, and more open elevations where fuels are scarcer, “and that is a benefit to us,” he said.
Lipp also briefly referenced the monitoring aspect of largely wilderness fires such as the ELK Fire and reluctance to send firefighters into precipitous, remote locations, the result of which he termed “typically not successful.”
In the event a firefighter at a remote location was injured, evacuation is extremely difficult and, with serious injury, potentially fatal, Lipp stated.
Hinsdale County Emergency Manager Phil Graham was upbeat, drawing smiles from the gymnasium crowd with his initial assessment, “we can’t keep meeting like this.”
Graham addressed the extreme complexity of wildfire management, saying a key component of the county’s evacuation process is determining “when to allow residents to return and return to normal.” On the other hand, he added, “it’s hard… you don’t want to yo-yo people,” having them return and potentially having to leave again.
Graham expressed thanks to personnel of both the outgoing and incoming Rocky Mountain Teams 1 and 2, Colorado Division Fire Protection & Control, adding a special commendation to out-of-town firefighters “who are here sacrificing their time to protect our homes and our community… keep them in your hearts and prayers.”
Others speaking at the August 7 meeting were Forest Service Public Information Officer Kimberlee Phillips from Montrose, and Norwood, Colorado-based Megan Eno who serves as Forest Service Agency Administrator on the Elk Fire.
Eno said that both Lake City and Norwood “have a lot in common… we’re not used to seeing fire in our backyards.”
Concluding last Friday’s public meeting was Austin Baker, Incident Command Trainee with Rocky Mountain Team 1, who acknowledged residents’ “fire fatigue” after fire on the landscape for multiple weeks.
Baker echoed the sentiment of the need for patience, stressing the importance of quality, ongoing communication between firefighters and leadership, including Hinsdale County Sheriff, Emergency Manager and county leadership, and government agencies BLM and U.S. Forest Service.
Baker said Rocky Mountain Team 1 is setting up Rocky Mountain Team 2 “for success” and expressed optimism “we’re headed in the right direction… and then the snow flies.”
SILVER WORLD spoke with two members of the 41-member Elk Fire Structure Division, Christopher Brubaker who shares group supervisor responsibilities with Jade Drause and whose work as structure protection supervisor primarily entails minute analysis of the wildfire’s structure plan.
Also briefly interviewed from within the Structure Division and before heading out into the field on Tuesday morning was Owen Johnson who heads up the north Lake City Elk Road Task Force which in addition to Elk Road in San Juan Hills Subdivision, also includes the corridor road through San Juan Springs Subdivision.
Chris Brubaker’s structure plan analysis is immense with over 700 houses widely segregated into four separate pods, one encompassing Lake City and the other three pods centered on Elk Road, San Juan Springs, and the Highway 149 corridor. Structural planning in each of the pods includes specific placement of inflatable 1,500-gallon water reservoirs known as “pumpkins” which are in turn connected to a complex arrangement of water lines geared to water protection of individual structures.
Periodically refilled using water pumped from a variety of sources, including the Lake Fork River and area ponds, the reservoirs supplied on site by 3,500 gallon tankers.
“Overall,” says Brubaker, he rates the Lake City community and northern subdivisions “as very will prepared in terms of mitigation already in place.” He says a majority of structures are “pretty defensible” in terms of fire protection.
Brubaker, who hails from Rapid City, South Dakota, is no new hand at fire fighting: he has worked as a fire captain and paramedic for 19 years and has been based in South Dakota with the Rapid City Fire Department the past 17 years.
Brubaker has worked closely with Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team 2 the past six years, most recently in June this year when he worked on the South Fork Fire at Crawford, Nebraska.
Owen Johnson, an 11-year Unaweep U.S. Forest Service employee based out of Grand Junction, is also within the Elk Fire structural division with particular focus on structures located adjacent to the Highway 149 corridor north of Lake City to the county line.
He refers to 40 structures located along the Elk Road-San Juan Springs corridor to the immediate north of Lake City. Within this corridor, he explains, a total of five 1,500-gallon pumpkin reservoirs are located within the corridor. The majority of the corridor’s 40 structures is now equipped with now-in-place water hoses which, in addition to the water reservoirs, can easily be hooked up to engines carrying water.
On Tuesday this week, Johnson’s structural protection work moved northward along the Highway 149 to Independence Trailhead and adjacent areas such as Jacobs Lane and Lake Fork Hunting & Fishing Club with the goal of supporting task forces and making sure initial attack equipment is close at hand.
Johnson was specifically questioned on north Lake City’s steep terrain and the prevalence of “hazard trees” and “snags” which make on-the-ground fire fighting exceptionally dangerous. From the structural division standpoint, he says the principal goal is structural protection while also acknowledging that on-the-ground firefighting in precipitous geography with standing dead spruce and snags is exceptionally dangerous.
“Snags,” he says, “are our enemy.”
Johnson was also questioned on the significance of “timber stringers,” typically heavily treed gulches with brush which under certain circumstances are natural fire conduits allowing fire to descend through otherwise barren mountainside.
In the event of stringers as fire conduits, managers specific strategies are preplanned, including safe locations to battle the fire and keep its from expanding.
In the case of the Elk Fire, fire personnel are keeping a close eye day and night on four or five heavily vegetated stringers on the west side of Highway 149 in the vicinity of Independence Trailhead and Larson Creek, including the Elk Road subdivisions.
Johnson shares the ominous fire fighting fact that dependant on wind and other weather events, wildfires such as the Elk Fire have the capability of “spotting” — send up and outward sparks — up to a half-mile distant.
Prior to the Elk Fire, Johnson’s most recent tenure with Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team 2 was work last week on the Rio Branco Wildfire near Pagosa Springs and, prior to that, Ouray County’s Gold Mountain Fire. Just this year alone, he has already logged in in excess of 100 days firefighting.
Prior to his work with Unaweep based out of Grand Junction, Johnson worked in similar fire fighting capacity “all over the place,” including Minnesota, Oregon, and elsewhere in Colorado.
Johnson feels at home in and around Lake City and is familiar with the “awesome’ Lake City backcountry after innumerable camping trips here, most recently with his just-deceased 13-year-old German Shorthair canine, memorably named Josie Wales, up Cinnamon Pass.
Johnson has plans for a new dog and looks forward to camping trips in the near future when wildfire is not the principal focus. “I can’t wait to get back,” he says.
Chad Hyatt, Operations Branch Trainee with Rocky Mountain Team 2 under supervisor of Colby Crawford, is gradually working his way up in the fire fighting ranks after previously serving in the role as Division Supervisor.
Within the Operations Branch, Hyatt oversees a myriad of details within Elk Fire divisions Alpha and X-Ray, northeast of Lake City to the Hinsdale-Gunnison border, and Division G immediately adjacent to Lake City. Within those division, he is primarily on the lookout for firefighter safety, added responsibilities being logistics, planning, finance, security, and operational facilities, all of which he sums up as “boots on the ground and meeting the needs of the community.”
Hyatt previously worked on the Gold Mountain Fire at its start for two weeks in July and gradually integrated into the Elk Fire starting on a scouting mission blending in with Elk’s prior supervisory team, Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team 1 starting August 7. Hyatt “shadowed” Team 1 on August 8 prior to the official transition for Team 1 to Team 2 taking over at the start of 14 days on Sunday, August 9.
Hyatt, who lives at Arvada in suburban Denver, explains the buffer which is created with direct and indirect firelines. Direct firelines include manmade separations which are excavated utilizing heavy equipment such as bulldozers, and indirect buffers which include natural geographic features lacking in fuels, and pre-existing roads, trails, and creeks.
New firelines under under discussion this week include a precautionary secondary line of defense for the town which is described as a direct man-made firebreak utilizing bulldozers at an unspecified location “above Lake City.” Work on that secondary line of defense may start as early as Wednesday this week.
A secondary line of defense being considered by Rocky Mountain’s Contingency Division is a combined direct and indirect firebreak on federal lands to the east of Highway 149 as a precaution in the unlikely event the fire jumps to the east side of the highway. As timing allows, archaeologists were brought in earlier this week to consider impacts which may result if a secondary, precautionary firebreak is developed east of the highway.
Again, just at press deadline on Thursday morning, WORLD receives photo — at left — from lower Lake Fork photographer Craig Palmer and separate news alerts on yet a second lower Lake Fork wildfire, the two-acre Steep Fire, which is now thankfully contained.
The lightning-caused blaze was first reported late Wednesday, August 12, at a location 200 yards off the Alpine Plateau Road in Gunnison County, above both the Ski-High/Ute Trail and Whinnery Ranch.
“Great progress” was reported late in the day on Wednesday with firefighters defining a fire perimeter and dousing the small blaze via helicopter with 14,000 gallons on water.
At last word, Steep Fire was contained and mopping up operations underway.