“There is a vast amount of timber here in the Northwest,” said Cecil. “In fact about one fourth of all the timber in the United States is located in Oregon and Washington. In spite of the fact that this timber is worth money, most of the fires in the forests are caused by the carelessness of man.”
“You don’t mean that they deliberately set the woods on fire, do you?” asked Bill.
“They don’t mean to, but the results are the same,” replied Cecil. “A camper forgets to put out his fire, he throws away a cigarette butt without extinguishing it, or he lights a cigar or pipe and throws the match down on the ground and the spark ignites the surrounding dried leaves. Then a fire is started in the woods. That is the reason for the campfire permits. It gives us a check on the people who come into the forests. We also have a chance to warn them about the dangers of forest fires and caution them as to the means that they should adopt to eliminate any chances of fires.”
“That’s very interesting,” said Bill Bruce. “Heretofore all that these woods have meant to me was just so many trees. Now I see the whole timbered area in a different light. Can you tell us how you go about locating a fire and what you do to put it out?”
“We have established lookouts on the highest peaks,” said Cecil. “Each of these lookouts has a map. As soon as he observes a column of smoke in the forest, he takes a sight on the fire and notes its bearing. The adjacent lookout does the same thing. As a result we have an intersection of two lines which gives the location of the fire. In the case of a small one, the local warden will gather together a few men and go and put it out. In the case of a large one, the forest supervisor mobilizes as many men as he can from the surrounding country and they try and localize it. In this way it burns itself out.”
“What do you mean by a small fire and a large one?” asked Bill.
“A small one is usually caught as soon as it starts,” replied Cecil. “A large one may cover thousands of acres and take hundreds of lives. The Hinckley fire in Minnesota burned over 160,000 acres, destroyed property valued at twenty-five million dollars and took the lives of four hundred and eighteen people. That was an unusually large fire. The Idaho fire covered larger acreage, but did not take as many lives. That fire burned over two million acres and burned eighty-five people to death. Recently we have managed to get the fires under control before they get anywhere near that large.”
“What per cent of fires are caused by carelessness?” asked Bob.
“About eighty-five per cent of the 28,000 forest fires occurring each year are due to human carelessness,” explained Cecil. “Each year we hope that the number will be smaller, but the automobiles are bringing more campers into the woods all the time. We are trying to educate our visitors up to the point where they will consider the trees their property as citizens of the United States and will guard against their destruction just as if they were privately owned. You probably have noticed the signs posted up everywhere cautioning people to use every care to prevent fires.”
“Can you always extinguish a fire with man power?” asked Bill.