- Fire rages on flanks of Baldy. Crews launch massive effort to protect valuable ski area. By Jason Kauffman. Idaho Mountain Express Staff Writer.
- Castle Rock Fire spreads up Baldy. 1,400 more Ketchum homes are ordered to be evacuated. Crews planned to work through the night. By Pete Zimowsky and Heath Druzin. Idaho Statesman.
Yesterday was expected to be kind of a “breather” on the fire. Predictions were for little wind. It was not like that at all !
Latest inciweb on the Castle Rock Fire. Link to a series of photos of the fire.
Updates on all the major Idaho fires (from the Idaho Statesman).
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Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University with specialties in natural resource politics, public opinion, interest groups, political parties, voting and elections. Aside from academic publications, he is author or co-author of three hiking/backpacking guides, and he is President of the Western Watersheds Project.
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Some folks from the Ketchum and other Wood River Valley areas are coming up to Stanley (where I live) to escape the Castle Rock fire smoke and trauma associated with evacuations and seeing a treasured landscape in flames.
I was in Ketchum when the backburns were set last week in Adams Gulch, Griffin Butte, Fox Creek and elsewhere, in what appears to be a successful attempt to prevent the fire from coming down into neighborhoods north of Ketchum. I understood the need for burning, but it was hard to watch nevertheless.
Last year about this time the Trailhead Fire in the Sawtooth Wilderness was threatening homes near Stanley. There were several tense days until the fire was put out. But there are millions of dead lodgepole pine trees that someday will burn here. In the meantime, we watch the Castle Rock Fire plume of smoke from 60 miles away, in somewhat disbelief that the big one came to the Wood River Valley first, not the Sawtooth area.
Last night at a local Stanley establishment, there was discussion how the Ketchum-Sun Valley area always has known how to throw a big bash — and if one has to have a wildfire, well, this one is getting national attention.
Seriously, I hope the fire does not burn homes and no one is hurt or killed. I also know that attempts have been made to try and get people who are living in the mountains and elsewhere to be more aware of fire danger. In my remainding lifetime, every summer will be one of fires. And then the fall will be one of burning slash.