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Sunday, June 28, 2015

WHERE'S THE FIRE?



Mike and I took the dogs for a short walk to the top of Plank’s Pitch and back at 4:30 Saturday afternoon. The dogs expect a constitutional at that time regardless of what their humans think. For instance, I thought it was way too hot for a walk, the temp registering at 100. The dogs stood the heat well, but on the return trip, Nellie moved from one patch of shade to the next, and when we got to the yard, she hurried to the pond.

Anyway, at the top of the Pitch, I said to Mike, “There’s a fire over there. . .” – toward Teakean Butte. At first he wasn’t sure he agreed, but eventually it was readily apparent. I surmised it was on the other side of the river, but it proved to be a brush fire on the lower end of Orofino’s Riverside – not all that far from us here. Apparently a car fire (how does a car catch on fire?) spread to the brush, but that’s about all the info I’ve been able to glean.

As suppertime approached, Mike mixed ice cream and I whiled away the time on Pinterest, dreaming over crocheted Barbie outfits as I waited for him to finish in the kitchen. Suddenly the attic fan went off, which was unsettling because it shouldn’t have. We thought there was something wrong with the fan. It wasn’t until Mike tried to start the ice cream freezer that we grasped the situation. At 5:40, we just plain lost electricity.

“Maybe it has to do with that fire,” I said, and long story short, it did! Mike called Clearwater Power to report the outage, and when the electricity was still off an hour later, he called again.

“They had to turn off the electricity while they fight that fire. It will be off another hour,” he reported to me.

With that we decided to move to Plan B for supper. I had already made a hearty salad and to that we added cold cuts for sandwiches.
 
When the electricity is off, our water is limited, too, because of the electric pump. Mike had just decided to take a brief shower anyway, when the electricity came back on – about two hours after it went off --  allowing us to finish up the evening routine and watch a little tv before bed.

This morning the temp was 71 at 6:15. As noon approaches it’s 92 in the shade and 96 at the pond. And I can hear lots of airplane activity, so I wonder if they’re still fighting that fire – or another. KW

[UPDATE: You can read about the fire here. They're calling it the "Canoe Camp Fire." As I post this, apparently they are still fighting it, at least by air.] 

6 comments:

  1. Thanks for the link to the story and pictures. Do you have a generator you could use if you needed to keep the well pump working if you needed to?

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  2. Our generator bit the dust and it was needed so seldom we didn't replace it. It would take a super powerful generator to run a 5 HP pump. You know, our well is just shy of 1,000 feet deep.

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  3. I don't think we ever used the generator here. We've never had a situation where the electricity wasn't back on within an hour or two. I guess "readiness" is food for thought for all of us. We keep some water on hand for emergency use.

    It's interesting that we have these local or regional fires and yet it's difficult to find info.

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  4. Yes, I was thinking of the generator in terms of keeping your well pumping water in case of emergency. But I guess the best thing in that case would be for you two to just get away and be safe yourselves.

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  5. Well -- I've always thought of being here for the "great emergency." We would have the water in the hot water tank as well as the holding tank-- and then there's the cistern. We shouldn't drink that, of course, but we could boil it if we had to for certain uses. In fact, I was looking forward to your coming as well. Bring your tuna, your peanut butter, and the bread you have on hand. We'll make out all right.

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  6. Hey--thanks for including us! I always have tuna, peanut butter and bread. :-) And lots more!! If necessary, we can party 'til there's no more.

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