This incident reminds us of the Deer Park fire serious injury and the Andrew Palmer fatality. The report for the Deer Park incident had this suggestion:

Agency aircraft are best suited to deal with accidents that occur on the fireline. More agency rotor-wing aircraft need to be equipped with the capability to perform extractions for medical emergencies. All methods of remote extraction should be evaluated and a standardized system of operation should be established. Our reliance on military and lifeflight helicopters to extract our most serious injuries needs to be reduced. These helicopters are not always available, and extraction capable agency helicopters would alleviate communication issues and provide more timely patient care.

As we said on August 27:

The U. S. Coast Guard and Los Angeles County Fire Department do this on a regular basis. Here are some links showing them in action:

LA County
Coast Guard

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(below is an excerpt from the Pyramid Butte fire report)

NUMBER & TYPE OF INJURIES/DAMAGE: One person – Warm Springs IHC crewmember, emergency transport to hospital via helicopter, injuries include basal skull fracture, fractured cheekbone, three fractured vertebrae, inter-cranial bleeding and internal bleeding. No other crewmembers were injured.

NARRATIVE:

On September 4, 2010 at approximately 1815 hours, crewmembers from the Warm Springs IHC were taking a break near the end of their shift on Division D of the Pyramid Butte Fire on the View Lake Complex. This location is in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness Area on the Mt. Hood National Forest, adjacent to the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). The crew had chosen a narrow, rocky gulley/ravine that provided some shelter from the wind as the location for their break. A crewmember was sitting up against the bank of the ravine when a large rock became dislodged from a point behind and just above him. The rock rolled down onto the crewmember, struck him mid-back, and continued to roll over his head forcing his body forward which pushed his face down with significant force into another large rock.

An EMT and wilderness first responder from the Prineville IHC who were working nearby, immediately responded to the accident site and performed the initial assessment. Due to the mechanism of injury and signs and symptoms, a backboard, c-collar and jump kit were requested within 5 minutes. Prineville IHC had the items at the PCT trailhead and they were brought to the scene of injury by Prineville crewmembers. Medic 1, located at a drop-point approximately 25 minutes away, was contacted and patient’s vital signs and status were relayed. Medic 1 then started travel to the PCT trailhead. Upon arrival of the backboard and c-collar, patient was immobilized using c-spine precautions.

Transport began down the PCT at approximately 1845 hours and the patient arrived at H-2, the closest helicopter evacuation site, at 1925 hours. Paramedic (Medic 1) walked in on the PCT and met the patient approximately halfway through backboard transit. Method of transportation to higher medical care was discussed. Given the nature of the injury, time of day, and length of time ground transport would have required over stretches of very rough, rocky roads, the decision was made to transport the patient by helicopter utilizing a Type 2 helicopter assigned to the incident. The helicopter was waiting at H-2 when the patient arrived there at 1925 hours. The helicopter lifted off H-2 at approximately 1930 hours and the patient was flown to Emanuel Hospital in Portland, Oregon. The helicopter landed at Emanuel Hospital at approximately 2000 hours.

The injured crewmember was wearing his hard hat and full PPE at the time. No one was working or seated above him at the time the rock dislodged.

Thanks Jim

We have added this to our animal-arson series.

The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office has provided a list of 140 structures that have been destroyed by the Fourmile Canyon wildfire and another 24 that have been damaged by the fire.

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UPDATE @ 4:00 p.m., Sept. 8

My favorite quote so far about the Fourmile fire is from an article today at the Daily Camera:

The fire burned in on itself, shrinking its overall size to 6,168 acres.

We need to figure out how to harness that technology or phenomenon, whatever it is, but it might put firefighters out of a job.

By the way, some of the comments on that article are interesting.

Boulder County has posted a new map of the fire.

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Air tanker making a drop on the Fourmile fire, Sept. 6, 2010. Photo: InciWeb

UPDATE @ 1:05 p.m., Sept. 8

Adam K. plotted the locations of the structures that have been reported by the Boulder Office of Emergency Management as having burned as of 9:42 p.m. on September 7. The information is preliminary and incomplete, and Wildfire Today assumes no responsibility for the accuracy of the data. Here is how the list of addresses with burned structures was described by the Boulder OEM:

9:42 p.m. – Sept. 7, 2010 – The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office is providing this information to residents who have been affected by the fire. The addresses listed below are of houses that the Sheriff’s Office has identified as destroyed by the Fourmile Canyon Fire. These addresses were determined from only 5-10% of the burned area, as that is the only area that could be safely surveyed today. Some parts of the burned area are more densely populated than others. In most cases, Sheriff’s deputies were able to identify addresses by the homes’ mailboxes, some of which are grouped with other mailboxes, so while we intend this to be an accurate list of addresses, we are working under difficult conditions in determining the actual address of each home.

We will continue to post more information as it becomes available following additional investigative work on Wednesday.

An overview map.

More detailed maps:

West side

Northeast side

Center area

Thanks Adam.

There is a report that nine volunteer firefighters lost their homes in the fire.

.

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UPDATE @ 9:20, Sept. 8

Kyle let us know about a recent map of the fire on a National Weather Service site. Thanks Kyle. I have mapped a lot of fires, and judging from the fact that this perimeter line is very jagged, rather than having a lot of connected straight lines, I’m thinking that it is very accurate. Here is a screen capture of the map:

Data from GEOMAC Wildland Fire Support, 2:10 a.m. 9-8-2010

The map below shows the last two perimeters of the fire provided by the incident management team. The one with the sections of straight line was from Sept. 7, at 6:00 a.m. and the other, dated at 2:10 a.m. today was probably made from the infrared mapping flight. Click on the map to see a larger version.

The Denver Channel has dramatic photos of homes burning.

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There is not a lot of new information available about the Fourmile fire near Boulder. A very recent update at the Inciweb site is calling it 7,100 acres.  The official Incident Status Summary (ICS-209) from last night includes this:

Significant Events: 20 subdivisions west of Boulder have been evacuated and 3 major County roads closed. Fire Continues perimeter growth and associated structure loss. Transition from Type 3 to Type 2 (Richardson) occurred at 1800 today (9-7).

Observed Fire Behavior: Crowning, running, spotting, creeping in Douglas-fir, Ponderosa pine and grass.

Planned Actions: Structure protection and damage assessment. Continue line construction on remote sections of fire.

When an updated fire map is available, we will post it here. The latest maps are in our update from yesterday and at InciWeb.

In the meantime, here is a map of the fire showing heat detected by satellites last night. The most recent fire activity (in brown) was on the northeast side.

Map of the Fourmile fire near Boulder, showing heat detected by the MODIS satellite at 4:18 a.m. Sept. 8.

The most current official report from yesterday on the number of structures burned was that they had surveyed 5-10% of the burned area and had documented 63 that had burned. When the fire conditions permit, they will go into other areas to record the damage.

The Gold Hill Townsite has some very good photos, some of them spectacular, of the fire. (UPDATE: so many people have gone to the site that it is down, saying “bandwidth exceeded”. Check back later.) It also has a link to some amazing video shot by a firefighter as houses burn; when you view it, click on “go full screen”.

We are hoping to get an updated fire perimeter map and a more accurate size of the fire that should be available following the infrared mapping flight from last night. As we reported yesterday, The U.S. Forest Service infrared mapping aircraft, N149Z, flew from Boise to Rocky Mountain Metro Airport last night, flew over the Fourmile fire several times and landed at 8:08 p.m.

Then at 2:02 a.m. this morning N149Z took off again, flew over the fire three more times, and landed back at Metro at 2:24 a.m. Here is a map showing the latest flight. KBJC is Metro airport, and Denver is in the lower-right.

Here is a time-lapse video that was shot last night of the Fourmile fire near Boulder.

More information.

Here is a list of the vehicles and the people that were injured.

Thanks Bruce

UPDATE @ 10:50 p.m., Sept. 7

The Boulder Office of Emergency Management, after surveying 5-10% of the burned area, has identified 53 houses that have been destroyed by the Fourmile fire. Due to the fire activity, they were not able to collect data in other areas.

ABC7 has information about the early stages of the fire, including transcripts from radio conversations and a report that a vehicle colliding with a propane tank may have started the fire.

At 8 p.m. the Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center reported:

Type 1 Incident Management Team, Thomas in briefing at 1000 on 09/08. 6,128 acres. IR [fixed-wing Infrared] flight tonight to determine size. Counting of structures lost will begin tomorrow. 20 Subdivisions west of Boulder have been evacuated and 3 major county roads are closed. Fire is growing around the entire perimeter. Crowning, running, and spotting fire behavior has been observed.

In fact, one of the US Forest Service infrared aircraft, a Super King Air 200 twin-turboprop, N149Z, has already flown over the Fourmile fire, and it looks like the Cow fire in Rocky Mountain National Park as well. The map below shows the aircraft’s flight path as it arrived into the area from Boise, flew over the two fires, possibly dodged some rain or thunderstorms, and landed at Rocky Mountain Metro Airport at 8:08 p.m. It has the capability to downlink the digital imagery wirelessly via Aircell while airborne. Then an Infrared Interpreter retrieves the files from a server, analyzes the data, produces a map showing the heat sources, draws an accurate fire perimeter, and calculates the acreage of the fire.

So, within a matter of hours we should have an accurate fire perimeter and acreage.

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UPDATE @ 6:15 p.m., Sept. 7

At a 4 p.m. press briefing today fire officials said that 7,100 acres had burned (later changed to 6,168 acres at the InciWeb site) and the fire had forced the evacuation of 3,000 residents. An inversion in the morning prevented air tankers from taking off, but later in the day eight air tankers had dropped 90,000 gallons of fire retardant by the time of the briefing. Three helicopters are also working on the fire. About 2,000 residences are without electricity in the fire area. With about half of the burned area being surveyed, they have identified 63 structures that have burned.

Here is a map produced today by Boulder County showing the perimeter and the evacuation area for the Fourmile fire. (We added the notes in red at the top.) The original higher resolution version of the map is HERE.

Click the map to enlarge it.

Another map of the fire perimeter can be found at the InciWeb site.

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UPDATE @ 5:00 p.m., Sept. 7

Here are some updated maps of the Fourmile fire near Boulder, Colorado.

The perimeter of the Fourmile fire, as of 6:00 a.m. Sept. 7, 2010. Click to enlarge.

Map of the Fourmile fire, showing heat detected by satellites at 1:05 p.m. on Sept. 7, 2010. The yellow line with the cross-hatching is the perimeter as mapped by firefighters today.

HERE is a link to a topographic map showing the fire perimeter as of noon today, but it is difficult to make out much detail.

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UPDATE @ 12:20 p.m., Sept. 7

Five heavy air tankers were available at the Rocky Mountain Metro Airport as of this morning at 10:30.

Here is the “spot weather forecast” issued by the National Weather Service at 11:00 a.m. this morning  specifically for the area of the Fourmile fire near Boulder:

REST OF TODAY

SKY/WEATHER………MOSTLY SUNNY.

MAX TEMPERATURE…..72-76.

MIN HUMIDITY……..9-13%.

20-FOOT WINDS…….UPSLOPE/UPVALLEY 6-12 MPH UNTIL 1500…THEN

SOUTHEAST 10-15 MPH.

TRANSPORT WINDS…..SOUTHWEST 12-20 MPH.

MIXING HEIGHT…….4000 FT AGL UNTIL 1400…THEN 7000 FT AGL.

AGL.

SMOKE DISPERSAL…..POOR UNTIL 1100…THEN GOOD UNTIL 1200…THEN

VERY GOOD UNTIL 1700…THEN GOOD.

HAINES INDEX……..4 LOW.

TONIGHT

SKY/WEATHER………PARTLY CLOUDY(40-50%).

MIN TEMPERATURE…..50.

MAX HUMIDITY……..45-55%.

20-FOOT WINDS…….SOUTHEAST WINDS AROUND 10 MPH UNTIL 2000…THEN

WEST 8-16 MPH WITH GUSTS TO 25 MPH ON THE RIDGES.

TRANSPORT WINDS…..SOUTHWEST 12-20 MPH.

MIXING HEIGHT…….6000 FT AGL UNTIL 1900…BELOW 1000 FT AGL

AFTER 2100.

SMOKE DISPERSAL…..FAIR UNTIL 1900. POOR AFTER 2100.

HAINES INDEX……..3 VERY LOW.

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UPDATE @ 9:42 a.m., Sept. 7

The Fourmile fire as imaged by the MODIS satellite on Monday.

The Fourmile fire near Boulder, Sept. 6, 2010. Photo: Paul Aiken

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Map of Fourmile fire showing heat detected by MODIS satellite at 3:31 a.m., Sept. 7, 2010.

The Fourmile fire has burned at least 3,500 acres and destroyed dozens of homes northwest of Boulder, including the homes of four firefighters who were working on the fire. Some of the communities impacted by the fire include Four Mile Canyon, Sunshine Canyon, Gold Hill, Sugarloaf, Pinebrook Hills, and Boulder Heights. Approximately 3,500 residents are under mandatory evacuation orders.

The map of the Fourmile fire near Boulder shows that the fire has spread quite a bit towards the northeast compared to the map we published yesterday.  On Monday the strong winds prevented aircraft from working on the fire until after 5:00 p.m. when the winds decreased and three were assigned, but on Tuesday morning four heavy air tankers, one lead plane, one large Type one helicopter, and two air attack ships will assist the ground-based firefighters, according to the Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center.

A few hours after the fire started a Type 2 incident management team was ordered, but due to the size and complexity a higher-qualified Type 1 team was ordered last night. On Tuesday the one of the Rocky Mountain Area Type 2 teams will work with the Boulder County Type 3 team.

Cooler temperatures and winds speeds of 8-12 mph on Tuesday should produce less extreme fire behavior than we saw on Monday.

For official information about evacuations, visit the Boulder Office of Emergency Management web site.

Here is a 3-D map of the Fourmile fire showing heat detected by satellites. Click on the map to see a larger version.

A 3-D map of the Fourmile fire near Boulder, showing heat detected by satellites at 3:31 a.m. Sept. 7, 2010. Click to see a larger version.

We will update this article throughout the day. Check back for more information.

It is possible that the heat the satellite detected was contained within the perimeter, and it is not necessarily spreading and consuming additional acres. However, there is quite a bit of heat coming from it — for a fire that was put on the back burner, so to speak, two months ago.

Cow Creek and Fourmile fires, mapped from heat detected by the MODIS satellite during the afternoon of 9-6-2010

Firefighters expected in July when they contained the Cow Creek fire by constructing a fire line around the northeast, east, and south sides of it that the fire would smolder the rest of the summer, and would only be completely extinguished by heavy winter snows. They also realized that there was some potential for the fire to spread to the west in the West Creek drainage.