well, that was exciting:
it was about 1pm when we went out to tour the area off the Bush Highway exit from Beeline, where a fire had broken out Tuesday, of which we could only see the smoke from the house - aired-down, went on FR1848, which has a wide view but couldn't see any charring . . . it took all of 5 minutes on the trail until we saw a cloud of black smoke emanating from close to the Bush Highway exit: some vehicle fire
I predicted the fire would spread to the desert in no time, and we turned around immediately - arrived at the Bush turn-off with flames already going about a half-mile down Beeline - the ramp to which was being closed right then, with us the first to be waved into the detour by Saguaro Lake/Salt River
we didn't air up until Phon-D-Sutton, because I didn't want to be caught on one-way roads in any s***-show that could ensue, with the Highway closed, but boats still being pulled towards Beeline, and a constant stream of afternoon traffic from the lake . . . - have someone blow a tire, and everyone is trapped - hopefully, the first responders we saw coming towards the fire didn't get stuck
which is -in fact- what happened to all the people out there on trails with their ATVs/UTVs, and all their trucks/trailers parked at the trailhead - massive Carbeque in the making - which we could see from the house when we got back 1.5 hours later: black smoke billowing up from the trailhead area every 20 minutes or so
even though air tankers got into the firefighting, they were not able to confine the fire to the west side of Beeline where it started: by evening, it had jumped Beeline and was burning further up into the Four Peaks area - so our entire rest of the afternoon and yesterday evening was spent watching the fire and the air traffic attendant to it: helicopters, spotters and air tankers - which came from as far away as Ft. Huachuca
this morning, it's very smokey outside and the outside air at the house is smoky, too
pics to come . . .
it was about 1pm when we went out to tour the area off the Bush Highway exit from Beeline, where a fire had broken out Tuesday, of which we could only see the smoke from the house - aired-down, went on FR1848, which has a wide view but couldn't see any charring . . . it took all of 5 minutes on the trail until we saw a cloud of black smoke emanating from close to the Bush Highway exit: some vehicle fire
I predicted the fire would spread to the desert in no time, and we turned around immediately - arrived at the Bush turn-off with flames already going about a half-mile down Beeline - the ramp to which was being closed right then, with us the first to be waved into the detour by Saguaro Lake/Salt River
we didn't air up until Phon-D-Sutton, because I didn't want to be caught on one-way roads in any s***-show that could ensue, with the Highway closed, but boats still being pulled towards Beeline, and a constant stream of afternoon traffic from the lake . . . - have someone blow a tire, and everyone is trapped
- hopefully, the first responders we saw coming towards the fire didn't get stuckwhich is -in fact- what happened to all the people out there on trails with their ATVs/UTVs, and all their trucks/trailers parked at the trailhead - massive Carbeque in the making
- which we could see from the house when we got back 1.5 hours later: black smoke billowing up from the trailhead area every 20 minutes or so even though air tankers got into the firefighting, they were not able to confine the fire to the west side of Beeline where it started: by evening, it had jumped Beeline and was burning further up into the Four Peaks area - so our entire rest of the afternoon and yesterday evening was spent watching the fire and the air traffic attendant to it: helicopters, spotters and air tankers - which came from as far away as Ft. Huachuca
this morning, it's very smokey outside and the outside air at the house is smoky, too
pics to come . . .
