The disagreement between an Idaho landowner and firefighters is drawing more attention. Rocky Barker, a reporter for the Idaho Statesman with a long history of writing about wildland fire, posted an article on the newspaper’s website today.
As we wrote on September 27, the owners of private property affected by the Tepee Springs Fire east of Riggins, Idaho were not pleased with the tactics and strategy being employed on the fire or their interactions with the Incident Management Team fighting the fire.
But some of the firefighters felt threatened by the land owners. According to a report filed on SAFENET, “Two of the land owners verbally accosted a BLM employee while armed with a weapon.”
The unidentified author of the SAFENET report also wrote, “…the land owners took it upon themselves to attempt a burnout and began igniting fire below crews without any communication or warning. Crews had to be pulled to safe areas….The land owners made multiple unsafe demands to fire fighters such as downhill line construction in extremely rugged terrain with fire below them, attempting burnouts on mid-slope dozer lines with no escape routes or safety zones, and to drop water from helicopters with personnel in the work zone (the land owners).”
Law enforcement officers had to be called more than once and two hot shot crews refused an assignment ordered by the incident commander due to what they thought were unsafe conditions caused by the actions of the landowners.
In Mr. Barker’s article he writes that the author of the very lengthy comment on our September 27 article left by “Landowner” was in fact Brad and Sarah Walters, the son and daughter-in-law of the owners of the Mountain View Elk Ranch on the West Fork of Lake Creek, three miles east of Riggins.
On their 1,200 acres the landowners raise elk which they allow their clients to shoot, charging $5,900 to $14,000 per animal depending on the size of the rack. Shooting a buffalo costs from $4,000 to $7,500. This kind of canned hunting of domestic animals is outlawed in Wyoming and Montana according to a 2006 article at KOMO news that featured the Walters’ ranch.
The video below is basically an audio recording of a phone conversation. It was posted on September 7 by Sarah Walters, and is described as a “conversation with Mark Giacoletto IC of the Tepee Springs Fire on 9-7-2014 at 1:30.”
Our take on the situation
All of the facts have not yet been ferreted out, but after reading what is available about this incident, here is how it appears to us. Admittedly, this is from the view of someone who was a full time wildland firefighter for 33 years, but is trying to understand both sides of what could be categorized, at this stage, as a he-said, she-said situation.
The Walters obviously wanted to protect their property which generates income from people being charged to shoot the elk they raise on their property. They probably felt that if any of the land burned it would diminish the esthetic appeal, appearance, grazing, the number of shooters they hosted, and water quality. By insisting on aggressive fire suppression tactics they may have thought that if there were any safety concerns by employing those tactics, that it was worth the risk to the firefighters. They apparently thought that there was a strong possibility that the fire would continue to spread significantly and burn their property.
The firefighters may have analyzed the fire conditions, the weather forecast, and the predicted fire behavior and decided that with the weather and the time of the year, there was little chance that the fire in that area would burn additional acres on the property. They may have also been concerned about the safety of the firefighters on the ground and in the air if they had to be committed to additional aggressive suppression activities in the rugged terrain. Mr. Barker reported that Sarah Walters was a firefighter for five years, but her expertise about fire behavior and appropriate firefighting tactics would pale in comparison to the knowledge, training, and experience available within the Type 1 Incident Management Team assigned to the fire.
Does anyone know the nature of the “armed confrontation”? A holstered or worn weapon is a very different thing from a waved / pointed / brandished weapon, or one held while giving orders or ultimatums. It’s hard to judge whether the confrontation was out of line or threatening without better info.
Also, is it known whether the telephone conversation mentioned previously was really with the IC, or with someone with less authority?
I’m no fan of government bureaucracy, but if you spent your life hating the government, and there comes a time when you need their help, best you keep your guns in the safe, and your mouth shut. You got no business asking, nay, demanding help from an entity you despise. Maybe you better get your own helicopters and fire trucks and hire a private fire fighting force to protect your ****. And who gave them rights to the elk. Sounds like a shady business with a lot of “government” assistance required. Ought to sell their property and give law abiding citizen hunters free elk tags on their land.
The controversy around what did or did not happen around the Elk Ranch aside a lot of good work was done on this fire. The same time things were going down at the ranch numerous structures along the Salmon River were being directly threatened by the fire. Given how famously nasty the Salmon River Breaks are for firefighting I was amazed at the structures that were saved by burnouts and other operations. Some of these places are nestled right up against the slopes in narrow side canyons as well. There is a lot more to the story about what happened on this fire than the events on Division Delta and much of that story is of doing well with limited resources. This fire made its biggest runs at the same time orders for every type of resource were unable to be filled. All we’ll hear about now though is the. One landowner who is truly pissed off instead of everyone whose property was able to be saved.
I agree with you Mr. Gabbert. Armed confrontations should not be tolerated. I would think that these types of situations would be considered hazards that should be mitigated. Total disengagement would seem the best course of action. In the municipal fire world, we have to watch out for people who want to kill or injure us. Incidents of assaults are not uncommon, and murders happen.
I dont know all the variables, and I doubt I ever will, but all this talk of take downs and slam downs and what ever pro wrestling/ LEO smack down reference a person can come up with are disgusting in my opinion.
If these land owners broke the law they should have been dealt with. If they were contributing to an unsafe work environment the situation should have been resolved. Possibly a NO-GO situation.
We have no obligation to work in such an environment.
But, was everything done to mitigate the situation? Was there any opportunity to come to terms with the situation before the guns were drawn? When the guns came out did tempers and egos get it the way of any sort of successful resolution?
I cant send my firefighters into a fully involved single family dwelling just because someone screams at me that there might be someone in the home. I have seen violence threatened, shoving matches even.
Sending in firefighters would be an escalation, perhaps a deadly one. Could have been the case here.
I just doubt that communication was adequate, and every year the US vs THEM mentality becomes less useful.
We were told that sometimes the public are not going to kiss our behinds, and have a plan in place for dealing with land owners and the public. Just dont make the situation worse.
Yes, Mr. Gabbert. Those two Rangers did not deserve to be assaulted, and I suppose that case would resemble a combat situation.
There will always be these types that HATE authority, or sometime they are just nut bars.
We should be trying to work more effectively with the tax payer, better communications, better relations. Marginalizing them and painting them as the lunatic fringe will only create further hostility and distrust of the Govt. Once again, just my opinion.
Here’s how the AP writes it up in US News & World Report: http://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2015/10/01/feds-probe-report-of-armed-resident-confronting-firefighters
I was one of several SEAT pilots flying out of McCall on this fire. We put a retardant line around the lodge and out buildings,the structures were in a cleared area. Word of the problems came up at briefing someone who was in a position to know thought the owners were unhappy because the place did not burn. Insurance maybe.
Your comment concerning the landowner’s intention regarding their insurance is unfounded and irresponsible.
High Country News has well documented threats to resource agency employees in the West.
Good point, Chris. Here are links to two articles in the High Country News that document threats and attacks on federal land management agency employees:
October 27, 2014: Defuse the West:Public-land employees are easy targets for a violent, government-hating fringe
June 29, 2015: New data released on violent threats to federal employees
Here is how the 2014 article begins:
“On June 5, 2010, Mark Brunk and Tim Rinehart were on a routine afternoon patrol, driving two federal pickup trucks down a dirt road through Happy Camp Canyon in southeastern Arizona. The two Bureau of Land Management law enforcement rangers were scouting for signs of illegal activity related to the Mexican border, among other things. Suddenly, a man in a civilian pickup roared past them, leaning out the window and angrily flipping them off.
The BLM rangers pulled over and got out their binoculars to watch the man for any further indications of trouble. The man stopped as well, climbed out of his truck –– and then opened fire with a high-power rifle.
One bullet smacked the hood of Brunk’s truck close to where he was sitting in the cab. Another shattered Rinehart’s windshield, temporarily blinding him with fragments of glass. As the shooter drove away, Brunk raced after him. Rinehart followed as soon as he cleared his eyes, and later squeezed off a dozen shots with his AR-15 rifle, putting holes in the shooter’s truck. But the man escaped.
Five days later, 69-year-old Tracy Levi Thibodeaux, a former building inspector, was arrested at a rural post office while picking up his Social Security check…”
The incident involving the confrontations with the armed ranchers on the Tepee Fire may not be “Kandahar”, like Mr. Zero said above, but these two federal employees who were just driving down the road came close to losing their lives because someone hated the federal government.
I agree with Chief Hawkins. When firefighters are trying to protect private land, but are confronted and threatened, and asked to leave the property, twice, by angry, armed residents, they no longer should take the unnecessary risk of attempting to protect that property.
No amount of explaining by the landowners can explain away the force driving this conflict, their undeniable, absolute hate & resentment towards federal authority, especially the Forest Service. It’s as simple as that!
They display zero empathy towards anyone else displaced by an emerging catastrophic wildfire literally tripling in size, causing evacuations, and mayhem. Their actions speak volumes; ignoring others safety, valuing property over people, assigning blame, while shucking responsibility for their actions.
These owners were absolutely not interested in learning, accepting, or participating in safe work practices that are time tested procedures, repeatedly placing themselves and others in compromising positions.
In their words ‘the firefighters were just standing around watching the fire burn, they had no intention of putting out the fire because there is NO MONEY made by putting out fires, only monitoring them’. Anyone who has fought wildfire knows there are times to attack the fire and there are times when you absolutely can’t, safely, being the operative word. And money isn’t by far the greatest motivation, it’s the personal challenge, group camaraderie and yes public service.
Nothing like holding the federal government responsible for a catastrophic wildfire, a NATURAL disaster. Intimidating unarmed firefighters with sidearms, then labeling them lazy money hungry opportunists.
The only problem I see from the Feds is their absolute capitulation when confronted by angry, gun toting sage brush rebels. The standard response to armed rebels should be to completely pull out all firefighting resources when confronted with these types. Instead the land agencies often turn a blind eye, pull the LEOs and send in the white hat firefighters to manage the situation, relying on good natured individual leadership to manage these people’s ego. Corrective action by senior agency officials should be to give Incident Commanders and Division Supervisors the authority to completely disengage fire operations when confronted by self entities, armed or angry rebels.
Armed rebels? This isn’t Kandahar. Sensationalizing the situation does not help either party involved.
It sounds like mistakes were made on both sides of the issue.
Well said, Hawk!
There is a long and nasty history of anti-Govenment bullies going after Fed employees, including throwing a bomb at a Ranger’s home in Nevada. Time to slam these folks down and treat them like the criminals that they are.
i just heard a conversation of two people who didn’t seem to know what was going on.. You can’t just order up helicopters from helibase as a civilian. Even if they sent them.. Who would be giving them target direction on the ground? The “IC” whoever the guy on the other side of the phone doesn’t know most of those answers about specific drainages etc.. (A competent division should) so he needs to just admit what he doesn’t know and stop saying “I understand”. That was really frustrating, I couldn’t even finish it. There are so many things wrong with that..(on both sides)
The Federal agent on the other end was properly professional in his exchange with a very concerned landowner who owns land being threatened by this blaze. He was also being respectful of a taxpayer who provides his wages. He was not in a comfortable position yet he maintained his composure. Admirable.
Regardless of what the families “business ” is… She does raise some valid points…
I do see both sides of the discussion though