CHUGWATER – Approximately 2,168 acres of grazing land burned near the Diamond Ranch west of Chugwater last week. The fire was noticed on Tuesday, Oct. 22 around 11 a.m., and extinguished by …
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CHUGWATER – Approximately 2,168 acres of grazing land burned near the Diamond Ranch west of Chugwater last week. The fire was noticed on Tuesday, Oct. 22 around 11 a.m., and extinguished by Wednesday just before 4 p.m. Approximately 60 engines, 100 people, and aerial support from SEAT, LAT planes, and Type I helicopters (see inset) were used to douse the flames.
Platte County fire warden Aaron Clark said the fire was giving the crew some difficulty as they were trying to box it off from the Diamond ranch buildings. “We had to focus a lot of attention to keep it from the Diamond – it was a pretty good bunch of work to keep it off.”
At one point, Clark said, there weren’t any engines where the fire was advancing in one location. “The Incident Commander Type III (see inset) that was directing the [planes] saw it. There was a LAT plane coming in and he told them to drop their slurry in front of the fire….it was fantastic to see what it did.”
Clark took a photo after the fact of the location of that drop, which he said, “Is as good of an example as I’ve ever seen to demonstrate how effective slurry drops can be.” He intends to use the photo in future wildland firefighter training programs.