Lebanon - 4/10

*Team Gold arrives at Laclede County in Missouri*

Chris: Appears we got here just in the nick of time.  What does that make us?

Zoe: Big damn heroes.

Chris: Ain’t we just.

All right, I may have stolen this exchange from Joss Whedon, but it fits as we played a vital role in the safety of Laclede County.  Most of the MDC members were off receiving training when 3 wildfires popped up.  It could simply be coincidence, but I got the vibe that the arsonists received word that MDC was operating with a skeleton crew.  One thing that the villains failed to anticipate was AmeriCorps's intervention.  By midnight the fires were under control with only 500 acres lost.

The first fire near Mohave was the worst because of the fluctuating winds.  The fire was moving faster than we could blow the line so we had to fall back a couple times for our own safety.  The winds became favorable a little after 5:00pm (roughly 2 hours into the fire fight) at which time we switched to a direct attack and quickly got a line and a back burn up to a nearby road to halt the fire’s advance.  I got to see a nice fire whirl in the process—imagine a tornado that is on fire.  That was pretty cool.

The second fire was being wrapped up by the local fire department by the time we got to it so the Incident Commander, Mike Hufferd, bumped us over to the third at Wolsey Hollow Overlook.  By this point it was dark out so we had to break out our headlamps.  We didn’t really need them.  The flames were 5 feet tall in places with embers shooting every which direction.  It was a miracle that those flying flares didn’t cause any spot fires.  After Will did a quick analysis he concluded that the wind was on our side and we set to work.  I took up the rear on this fire looking for snags to rake around, moving larger sticks out of the line, keeping an eye on the fire and making sure that it stayed on the proper side of the line.  Due to the rough terrain the drip torches were having trouble making a consistent line so I incorporated a trick I learned.  I put some leaves on my broom rake, held it over a fire, and then spread the flaming debris over the unlit sections.  Worked like a charm.  There were a couple of embers that flew over the line but I quickly snuffed them out.  I’d say by 11:00pm we had our area under control and we were requested to help with a spot over on another line.

After the spot over we met up with the IC and remaining fire fighters who thanked us and told us we did an amazing job.  I was happy to hear it, but the exhaustion is outweighing that warm fuzzy feeling.  All I have to say before I crash is never go to a fire without contacts.  I made that mistake today and my eyes would not stop watering (nor would my nose for that matter).  Well it’s that time again.  Good night friends!  Know that I am safe and sound and I’m wishing you all the best.

Photo taken by Kelly Kaufmann.