Chapter Eight - Meanwhile....Back at the Ranch
Twenty-eight (28) days had passed since the Blimnites had descended on Candle and Kiana. Our “fire base” now boasted a population that varied anywhere from one hundred fifty to three hundred people depending on the comings and goings around the clock.
To the immediate west of our runway, actually about eight miles west, was the eastern border of a 360,000 acre fire
that had been burning for weeks. Ten miles to the east of our position was a 50 to 60 thousand acre burn.
I’m sure there was something to the south too, but I’ll be darned if I can remember where or how far. And visibility ranged from a couple of miles
if we had a breeze down to..oh...a 1/16 of a mile if the breeze died and the fires were really cooking.
At times, once for three days, all inbound air traffic came to a halt which resulted in one of the sillier
yet totally believable government absurd edicts.
If Crusty and Rhiney were beginning to regret their decision to help out on this project, I gotta’ give ‘em credit. They never let it show. The now had pretty much given up mining for the remainder of the war with the fire gods and were full time managers of what was now a pretty much 24 hour a day chow hall. I really believe that, even at the bargain prices the two old codgers were charging per meal, they were making more dough (literally AND figuratively) than they ever would have made mining that summer.
The government provided the food and within days of our arrival added the first kitchen “staff” member. On the BLM payroll of course! By this date the paid kitchen staff had itself swelled to almost a dozen workers, under the direction of the two former miners. Although they almost always had an apron on and a pot to stir much of the time; alot of their time was spent on “executive” functions such as ordering food, planning menus, and the ubiquitous Blimnite accounting paperwork. And much time was spent in the dining room glad-handing the “customers”
and getting 1st hand critiques.
Well, all the potato skins, orange peels, watermelon rinds, and discarded steaks leftovers et.al. HAD to go somewhere. And so Candle had her first “dump” since the earliest days of the century. It was smack dab almost centerfield on the south side of the runway. The runway located about equidistant between a couplea’ HUGE fires.
And, on a daily basis, the C-46's and Piper Lances that flew our fuel in from Ft. Wainwright left Candle stuffed to the rim with...GARbage! Lots and LOTS of garbage. Except....when the planes couldn’t get IN. And then the pile built, all too rapidly it seemed. So. Here we sit in camp beside a humongous pile of non-edible trash, right? Well. Maybe to you and me, it’s non-edible.
BUT! To every flappin’ BEAR, fleeing from the fires, this is like hanging out an “All You Can Eat” buffet sign! Let me tell ya’. The walk from town to the airstrip down that narrow, brush surrounded road got pretty damn exciting for a while. I took to traveling the 3/4 mile distance with a flare OPENED and just READY to torch off!
Upon noting this new minor inconvenience to our Ft. Wainwright (no bears THERE) based Blimnite Headquarters folks, we were quite discouraged with their response to our request to bury the offending pile. This in hopes of reducing our little brown bear problem. The word from on high was that, to bury the refuse would risk polluting the ground water table or some such nonsense.
By Day Three of no airplanes, the trash pile had grown to better than twelve feet and a diameter of forty feet or so. Yogi and Bobo hadn’t had it this easy with the pic-a-nik baskets in Jellystone Park! And they wasted no time getting the word out to all their relatives. We had BEARS. Bears in pairs. It was bear Happy Hour. I know there were bears stopping by on their way to somewhere ELSE just because they heard about the great “twofer”. Get some free grub and scare the CRAP outta’ summa’ those two-legged thingies.
Again we petition Supreme Fire Headquarters at Ft. Wainwright. May we BURN the damn trash then???
Now. Here’s where once again we are just bowled over by the either intelligence or audacity of their reply. “Burning the trash will create MUCH SMOKE! That is AIR POLLUTION! Unacceptable. Maintain Trash Mountain until able transport to Fairbanks. Supreme Fire Headquarters...OUT!”
Well. All I can say is I hope the statute of limitations has expired. I confess. After getting that response I strode immediately across the runway and over to our refueling depot where I latched onto a 5 gallon jerry can of 115/145 octane. This I accidentally spilled all over the lower portion of the trash pile, merely moments before accidentally discarding the burning Fire Chief Kitchen size matchstick that I had used to light off my after dinner smoke.
Over 200 trained firefighters in the vicinity and not ONE lifted a finger to battle the blaze. We stood and watched as the smoke poured off the top of the pyre and rose to the dizzying height of 15 feet or so before disappearing completely. Into the REST of the smoke.
As for me. My BLM logs showed 207 hours in the last 28 days. No. That’s NOT a misprint. I meant two hundred seven flying hours in twenty-eight days. Don’t ask me how we did it legally. Something about the interpretation of “public use” aircraft or something. ‘Cause I KNOW there were some days where I did a good ten hours.
As I said, I was WHIPPED.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch.....( I always wanted to be able to USE that line!) Back in Kotzebue things hadn’t been fairing so well for the home team.