Christmas Tree Cutting Patrol Day 6, Sunday, December 15th

[LCPilot]

Meet at the Divide Philips 66 at 7:45 am. Leave at 8:15 and go to the Rule Ridge parking lot at 8:30. That is where we air down and get a briefing on the latest conditions, areas to patrol, maps etc.

Remember to bring a GMRS radio (we use channel 5-0), recovery gear, winter clothes, tire chains, coffee and lunch.

We do a debrief at 3:00 pm back at Rule Ridge, air up and go home.

Please reply to this thread if you plan on going on this day.

Here is the link for Tree permits. https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/psicc/news-events/?cid=FSEPRD1215755
Attached is a PDF of the Tree cutting area and the FS roads that we patrol.

 

[Goslow]

I’ll be there.

 

[LCPilot]

I'll be there.

 

[LCPilot]

Scott Darrow called me. He was in the FJ Cruiser from last Sunday. I invited him to come up and join us.

 

[wonderlc]

I will likely make it.

 

[ICD FJ40]

Meet at the Divide Philips 66 at 7:45 am. Leave at 8:15 and go to the Rule Ridge parking lot at 8:30. That is where we air down and get a briefing on the latest conditions, areas to patrol, maps etc.

Remember to bring a GMRS radio (we use channel 5-0), recovery gear, winter clothes, tire chains, coffee and lunch.

We do a debrief at 3:00 pm back at Rule Ridge, air up and go home.

Please reply to this thread if you plan on going on this day.

Here is the link for Tree permits. https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/psicc/news-events/?cid=FSEPRD1215755
Attached is a PDF of the Tree cutting area and the FS roads that we patrol.

Im in.

 

[Goslow]

Today was a mostly uneventful day although we did rescue one Jeep grand Cherokee. It was cold and windy most of the day to the point where I didn’t even want to make coffee using my Jetboil. David, Bill, and I went on today’s patrol. We mostly stuck to the main roads as they were very few tracks going down side roads. We helped several people to know where to find good trees and we gave people advice about how far to take their cars in on road 357, considering the amount of snow and drifting.
We received a radio call from a Ranger that there was a car stuck pretty hard on road 339 off of Highway 67. We hustled down there and found a late model Jeep Grand Cherokee stuck in the ditch facing uphill. This is one of the newer Jeep models that has no tow hooks. The driver had hooked up a 2 inch ratchet strap to his sway bar and David told him that would not be acceptable and to find a better place. He then tied it to a cross member. After attaching the ratchet end to the loose end of the strap and making sure it had several tight turns around the ratchet, David attached the hook to his bumper with a D ring shackle. We knew this would be safe because pulling power was limited by his tires’ traction on the snow and ice. His pull was unsuccessful because of the low traction and the depth of the grand Cherokee in the ditch. During the rescue, Bill stood in a strategic location to provide traffic control.
We hooked up my brand new 20 foot snatch rope, just received on Thursday from Amazon prime for this trip, between my rear bumper and David’s front bumper. After removing the slack, we had enough total traction that we were able to gracefully pull the grand Cherokee out. A couple of the ladies in their group were so relieved that they gave us hugs.
One of the Rangers helped some people in a Nissan get unstuck, and there was no other action on Rd 357 except for talking to people. At the end of the day, we decided that giving people help in finding trees and knowing where not to drive is probably as valuable as rescuing people from being stuck.

 

[LCPilot]

After pulling out the Jeep on 339 we went back up on 357 and did our last sweep before turning in radios and signs to the Forest rangers. Bill went hoe and Vic and I drove all the way North on 357 since we saw people still driving in and looking for trees about 3:15. The wind was blowing strong enough to make up to 2 foot deep drifts across the road. We aired up tires and headed down 67. Since I was driving past 339, I just took a drive down past where we pulled out the Jeep. When I came back to the parking lot a couple was loading up a tree. in a GMC Canyon. I told them that I would wait until they were out of the area. They gave a mighty try, but bald street tires were no match for the hard packed icy road. I hooked a strap to the truck and helped them up the road to where they could get out on their own.