[Schroder]

In the Herald: Trapped by 2,600-acre fire, hikers ran past flames to safety

[HitTheTrail]

Or you can just chill out in a place where a fire has no fuel to burn.

And you think I am going to hike into the teeth of that.

[Kim Brown]

When Craig Romano was doing all the hikes for the Day Hiking series, he was on the PCT at Spectacle Lakes when that area began to burn. He said running down the PCT while the forest all around him was burning was terrifying. Reading about the campers that got stuck in the 30 Mile Fire gives me the willies, just thinking about them standing outside the firewoman's shelter begging to be let in, and her heart-wrenching decision - to do so would overwhelm the shelter's capability, meaning she would die along with them; Leaving them outside to die meant she might live - while they die. She let them in, and they all lived, thankfully.

[treeswarper]

[rbuzby]

There was a TR on WTA by some people who went up Bachelor creek to do trail maintenance during the fire in the area. They had to hike out through some burning forest. Maybe don't go hiking in an area where a wildfire is a few miles away?

[Schroder]

I believe the people in the article were doing the Ptarmigan Traverse and started before the Downey Creek fire began. Others were on Miners Ridge when it began. I think the article offered some good advice on what to do when confronted with the situation.

[Sallie4jo]

So..being one of the backpackers on Miner's ridge when the Downey Creek fire exploded.. 1. One of the people in our group called darrington rd prior and we were told, the dcf wasn't a problem as it hadn't done anything since August 18th and on the inci fire website the fire wasn't even posted( i was looking) 2. We began on the Tuesday after labor day and there were no fire issues that day there. On Wednesday we hiked up to miners ridge from the 9 mile camp. 3.. Wednesday night we were told (by Phyllis R) the Suiattle road was closed and we would need to think about hiking out to trinity or stehekin. We had planned to leave Friday and take two days out via the Suiattle where our cars were. We were told the fire grew to 350 acres. 4. Thursday we took a day hike and that afternoon we saw the fire had taken off..we were staying in touch with Phyillis and Paul Reed who were "vacationing" at the lookout. They were in touch with incident command. They were having difficulty getting specific information about what was happening. The 7 of us on the ridge(not all hiking together) agreed that night we were going to get up really early Friday morning and head out via the Suiattle by 7 am. We ageed we would meet phyillis and Paul to get an update b4 leaving Friday am. 5 Friday..we ..the 7 of us were heading to the trail as planned when Phyllis met us and asked that we go back to a place we could all talk/hear. She told us incident command was asking that we shelter in place that day. Although the smoke was terrible..i could think of worse places to hang out. We had image lake all to ourselves with 1 bear. And they invited us to come to the lookout 4 dinner and updates. We were told the fire grew to 1000 acres from the day b4. Phyllis gathered our names, contact names, car types at the trailhead. She was going to radio that down. Dinner was good..we talked about possible exits and agreed amongst ourselves that we were going to head out in the morning via the Suiattle as we thought it would be our last chance. We knew that night the fire was 100 feet above the trall..little else. We felt it best 2 try as we had several not real strong hikers who were concerned about the distance to trinity or stehekin. And there was also the food issue...we had all planned 2 be out Saturday. 6.saturday morning..as planned we were at the trail to head down by 7. Incident command again wanted us to shelter in place, but we said we would not, that we were going to go as a group..no one left behind. (We went down in 3 groups, fast, slower and slowest) 7. At the rest/water stop at 1pm..Phyllis and paul joined us..the slow ones, saying they were able to tell incident command that they had the 1 and only radio that could help get us out. So we moved on toward the trailhead. About 4 miles out the fastest group came running back saying the fire was burning on the trail..with flames and trees down. Phyllis listened, assessed and said we will continue to move forward. At 2 miles from the tailhead we stopped as she radioed incident command and explained where we were and what was reported to her. In maybe 15 minutes she pulled us together and explained we would be met but several fire crew who would walk us throgh 1/2 mile or so of trail fire. We headed on, smoke was thick and then we met the fire crew who instructed us how to walk and what to watch for..using all of our senses. In no time the 9 of us and 3 dogs were in our cars being led down the road through fire for 2 miles or so. I write all of to say even when one does check about issues, nature often times makes a different call. We were lucky having Phyllis and Paul on vacation (ha) at the Miner's ridge lookout. (Phyllis works for the forest service) We were also lucky because we all worked well together even though most of us were strangers. A gift of an adventure.

[maurella]

Did you notice much in the way of winds before that fire kicked up?

[Sallie4jo]

It was hot..not really windy during the time we were there..a light breeze..nothing more.

[Sculpin]

"Fire can spread quickly — many times faster than you can run." Just quibbling but...no it can't. If your path is clear, you can outrun the fastest wildfire. However, fire moves fastest up hill, the direction in which you move slowest, so YMMV.

[treeswarper]

[Pyrites]

Thanks, TS.