and then there was the 49er Fire of 1988.
map and story…
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So many stories from the 49’er fire! It was a gnarly++ event!
88 was a big impactful year in so many ways. In fact it was a national wildfire strategy changing year and imo the terms “mega fires” & “complexes” really got defined and became cemented in our wildfire language going forward!
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I was a Division Supervisor when I arrived on the 49er from Susanville. I was assigned around Lake Wildwood. During that first shift I swapped almost every resource I had with my neighboring DIVS as the fire worked down the drainages and then up into the structures, from one division to the next. When we finally got out of the structures and into the pure wildland we started getting a north wind and we chased it all the way down to Highway 20. We held it on the north side of 20 until it finally jumped the highway and then chased it toward Beale AFB until I was finally relieved. Miles from where I started.
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Thank You My father was an evacuee from Lake Wildwood
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I was young then, lived on the old ranch in the middle of Lake Wildwood (ranch still there). Dead center of the fire front.
I got a front row seat, we did not leave. We turned the animals out of the barns in case the straw caught fire but no buildings were lost. Irrigated pasture and we had plenty of water. We had one house close to the unmaintained vacant land and my dad, 2 uncles and grandfather fought the fire up there. I remember seeing a lick of flame twice as high as a big ponderosa pine up there. They had taken shelter inside the house and went back at it after the fire front passed. Saw boats burned loose from their mooring out on the lake burning. That is what got me the bug and I worked as a firefighter for some years.
I remember one of the old timers repeating a quote from BC Ed Waggoner that they were seeing the fire of the future. How right he was.
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I really appreciate you sharing that experience! Thank you for your service too! So many of the “fire folks” that i hold in high regard have stories and many lessons learned from that fire. I was just starting my fire career after high school in 88..
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Ed was Operations from the get-go on the 49er. I don’t know how many days he stayed out there without coming off the line.
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We lived across the river in Weimar. I remember going over to GV to help with the animal evacuation centers. One of the main reasons I decided to go wildland… We were on OC-1 together in 99
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We won’t discuss the crew bus or what caused the driver Carl Vogt to open the door at 70 mph
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