 But the night would bring no cooling down for, instead, torrents of fire would sweep the land. August 24th, 1970. Forty-five fires burned in the Wenatchee National Forest in north-central Washington, all touched off by a lightning storm during the night. Forest crews are sent in to circle or attack every fire. With natural lakes abundant in this part of Washington, there is no shortage of water. For Wenatchee officials, these first hours are crucial, for once the sun has had a chance to heat the earth, even the smallest fires can become raging infernos. At 1 p.m., a superheated ground fire whose temperature has risen to 2,500 degrees begins sucking in the surrounding oxygen. The more it takes, the more force it builds from within, and so generates its own winds. Firefighters call it a blow-up. One of the most powerful and uncontrollable forces on the face of the earth, but found a way to control the force of wildfire. A blow-up, the scientists say, is comparable to the explosion of a 20-kiloton bomb. Its temperatures ultimately rise to 3,500 degrees. Its winds can reach the force of a tornado. 33,000 acres have burned. 15 of the initial fires are totally out of control. Each has a different name, linked to a geographical starting point. Gold Ridge, Mitchell Creek, Poison Creek, Puga Mountain, North Tommy and South Tommy, Slide Ridge, and Signal Peak. Yet together, they're part of a single disaster, which officials already call one of the worst in the history of the state. A beleaguered national forest must call for help. Sure and Alaska, firefighters converge in Wenatchee. Full-time foresters, Indian specialists, college and high school students. Ultimately, they will number more than 8,500. Many are weary, for already this year, 13,000 fires have attacked the nation's forests. With amazing swiftness, the quiet enclaves of North Central Washington have been transformed into staging areas. The solitude of a vacation wilderness has been broken. As if in some distant land, some other place on earth, great machines rend the silence, and young men are led against an enemy. Until two days ago, this was a quiet camping ground for summer vacationers. In 48 hours, the Forest Service has turned it into a totally self-sufficient city for 2,000 men. Fire boss Don Peters, a career forester with 35 years' experience fighting fires, was summoned from his home in Oregon to run all operations out of Alta Lake. His first job is to try to organize the massive firefighting effort. Bob Krell, he was here before we came in, and could I assign him to you and have him help you and try to throw you off? All right, well, let's go over now and give a talk to him. Because you're getting barked down with too many details. It's getting too big for one man. On Wednesday, August 26th, the effort to circle the fire is pushed, but under a worsening fall of smoke. Atmospheric pressures have formed a ceiling over the fire areas. The smoke cannot escape. The air tankers, which are so heavily relied upon for slowing down the progress of fire, cannot fly. The elements have combined to create a smoke screen which the pilots are unable to penetrate. Beneath the smoke, the fire will continue to move unchecked through the night. Thursday, August 27th, the weather this day, a crazy conspiracy that baffles and frustrates the firefighters. Winds gust up to 40 miles an hour, yet the sickening gray-brown smoke hangs thick, almost obliterating the sun. Summer resorts like Lake Shilan become ghost towns, choked by the smell of burning trees. Fire suppression costs are averaging half a million dollars a day. Mobilization of the firefighting army is almost complete. Thousands of men are out on the lines, but their efforts are futile against the driving winds. 58,000 acres of timber have burned, nearly 6 million trees. Now many of the smaller fires have run together, and three massive burns pose the greatest threat. Mitchell Creek, Gold Ridge, and Antioch. I'd like to bring you up to date on what we've got. Last night, we were a little bit optimistic on what we were going to get, but the public information that we're getting shows that on Mitchell Creek, here the fire has bulged out, it's gone across Great Creek here. It's giving us a little trouble. We're having a little trouble here. Now, on the rest of the fires, things have changed and changed in a hurry. Gold Ridge, which you may have heard about earlier, and this is as of 1500, 3 o'clock, has broken out of the lines, is going towards the west, towards the town of Hardenbore. The fire is visible on the ridges above Hardenbore, and the people are packing to pull out. Scattered along a narrow winding road, some 50 homes comprise the isolated lumber town of Hardenbore. The name means the place to see the forest. This fire moves slowly down the slopes of the valley toward Hardenbore's homes and the lumber mill where most of its residents work. Ultimate responsibility for stopping it rests with one man, Fire Boss, Ralph McCurdy. We can see it from here. We've got another spot even further down now. We may be a day late in the dollar short on that one. Up as drop 400 gallons of water, the effect is like isolated drain drops. The fire is too widespread. Visibility remains bad, and throughout the day, bomber drops are too high and too infrequent to be effective. 100 men have arrived at a base camp set up in Hardenbore's lumber mill. None will rest until the battle is decided. Everything is improvised. The milling pond becomes a helicopter water hole. Pretty much moving the other direction towards the west, but right now we're just in a state of flux and we don't really have any good comment. The Civil Defense did ask that residents in this area water down their houses. Does this mean there's a real danger of this fire coming over the hill? As of right now we don't expect it to come over. Weather conditions get severe enough anything can happen. By 4 p.m., the fire is within 200 yards of some homes, and neighbors join in a desperate primitive effort to save those in most immediate danger. Man can do as any effect. The creeping fire maintains its steady pace, burning through the thick undergrowth and gnawing at the roots of trees. Ultimately, heat becomes too intense for the firefighters, and at many places along the Hardenbore Road, they'll be forced to back away. 4 p.m., with no relief in sight, some residents prepare to evacuate their homes. Mrs. Goldman, what are you feeling right about now? I'm scared to death. I feel pretty good because all my friends are here helping me. But it isn't very good to watch them go up and she works the heart for them. Are you taking out of the house personally, everything? Just personal belongings, anything that I can't replace. You know, dishes that you just can't replace have been given to you, things like that. Clothes. You have other people helping you also? Yeah. My sister came up from Oregon to help me. What are the children doing? Well, my two little girls, I shipped to an auntie Monday night when this all started because they got scared right off the bat, because they know what it can do. 5 p.m., gusty winds shoot flames into the treetops. Now, no one can predict how quickly and in what direction the fire will run. Trying to hold a line above Adenbor must be pulled back into town. As the fire picks up speed, anxiety grows for men still on the lines. The Adenbor Road is their only way out. Do you go and jump over the mad river? No, it hasn't jumped mad yet because the mad river goes up this way, but there's nothing going to stop it, I don't think. The way these winds are right now, she's going right up that bridge just to see if that's going to go. 5.35. For one crew above the town, the pullback seems merely the routine ending of another long day. But unknown to them, fire has jumped the road ahead, generating heat and smoke on both sides. They start out totally unaware that for the next 90 seconds, they will run a choking gauntlet of smoke and flame. By six o'clock, all the men have been pulled back to safety. But high winds are blowing sparks and burning branches across the valley. The outlook is grim. A summer cabin at the edge of town disappears within minutes, apparently touched off by a spark landing on the roof. Local firemen had watered it down less than half an hour before. The residents have decided to stay. They watch the approaching fire quietly for a state of shock disbelief. Facing the strong possibility of total disaster, forest service officials reach a desperate decision. For watered down line behind the road homes, a backfire is started. Its purpose is to burn uphill to the oncoming fire and deny it further fuel. A risky procedure, but there is no acceptable alternative. The officials are certain the backfire will succeed, but the townspeople and firefighters are like. There is no sense of victory this night. In the backfire alone, 150,000 trees will die, many of them two to 300 years old. The entire valley has been raped by fire. Its natural beauty destroyed for at least a generation to come. As the firefighters still rage far through, professional crews, so-called hot-shot teams, are sent into critical areas. These men come from Redding, California and are led by 34-year-old Charlie Caldwell. We've been on a total of 16 fires this summer prior to the Mitchell Creek fire itself. Naturally, the guys, it's hard on them. As a hot-shot crew, they do get some of the toughest and longest shifts on the fire line. This is what they're trained for and we realize ahead of time that we're going to be put in these positions. Our among the proudest firefighting crews in the country, and while sometimes called upon to perform heroic tasks, their worth is often proved in more obscure and inaccessible reaches of the forest. Here they cut fire line with cool, relentless skill from dawn to dusk day after day. Because of their training, men like these are rarely caught unaware by fire. Yet, even they must pay a price. The end of each season leaves their lungs cruelly contaminated by dust and smoke. Charlie Caldwell has already been warned by doctors he must quit soon or face permanent damage. For others in his crew, fate will play even more cruelly. Within a few weeks, two of his men will die in an air crash while fighting fires in Southern California. More than 70 bulldozers are at work battering out fire lines at the rate of half a mile every hour. And by now, thousands of men are laboring on the line. Some are drawn by a sense of adventure. Others feel impelled to defend land and forest gear to them. And many are here simply because with overtime, a man can earn as much as three to four hundred dollars a week. When did you guys first hear about the fire? Monday. We were on a small fire in our district and heard we'd probably leave in that night so we just got ready and left. When did you get out to this baseball? I think Wednesday. We were in Wenatchee for a day. Why are you fighting fires? For the money. Also, there's a little grammar in it. Not a whole lot. It's just sort of dirty, mean-run business once you get right down to it. The working day grows longer, sometimes sixteen hours and more. Smoke, heat and exhaustion take their toll. Minor injuries are more frequent. The chance of tragedy increases. This fatigue saps alertness and caution. So by the morning of August 28th, the Forest Service needs reinforcements and has issued a call for volunteers. Six miles west of Ardenbor, a volunteer group comes on the lines. A few regulars are among them, but most are youngsters, untried and untrained. They had come to the Ranger office in Leavenworth, Washington and asked to fight fire. Their crew boss is well aware that he alone must assure their safety. If you want to make damn sure that everybody realizes this is a plain old kid's stuff, you can get your ass burn here in a hurry. So let's keep our guys together and don't let anyone warn and off someplace. If somebody gets sick, take care of them because you could get your butt burnt. How far in do you want to go? Yeah, I'll go out about 20, 30, 40 feet and get her going good because we've got suction from the other way now. If we take advantage of it, it might make it worse. Turn this way. We aren't going this way. No, drop on the other side. I'll see you to get back. If you need anything hard on your radio, I'll be on the radio down here. Head up there, you guys. Normally, John Segal would command but the situation is far from normal and Chance has given Segal an unexpected opportunity. A steady wind now blows from the west. He may be able to backfire here and hold this line. Get with Frank and... Don't take... You're not going with him. Okay, tell me how. John, I'll leave the radio. You better take it. We might have to get John in there. Why, you're coming down this way though. Okay. Don't see my name. No, by God though, you know, you look around and the crew is here and they're all young kids. Every damn one of them, half of them don't know, sick of them, you know, to start with. They do a damn good job. They got a little somebody that knows what they're doing with them. And they learned the next year they come back, they did it twice as good, I've had the same crew and I've got over 11 work now for about four years. And as they graduate, we'll pick up another one and he'll go all the way to school. But the second year, he's real good. He can get a lot of work out of it. A lot of know-how. But the first year, it's really rough. Within 15 minutes, the backfire surges to meet the major blaze, cutting off its possible line of advance. Wind conditions remain ideal. We started from the creek and came straight out just different, faster than you know. Wind was just perfect. How fast can you go? How fast can I go? If you've been to the fire station here or not. Well, we came up in about 15 minutes. Is this a summer job? Summer job, I'm a speech therapist. I'm going to be, I'm a senior next year. Central, unfortunately, state college. Not everything's working good. So far, we've got about an hour yet. I've got our board getting some smoke now. Well, look at the head on that thing. You cut one of them trees right there and you'd probably con it about 180 years, wouldn't you? That took 200 years to build that thing and grow them trees. Now we're burning up an hour and a half. 32 miles away, then-boss Bob Boston surveys a disastrous new breakdown. Fire has suddenly swept into black canyon, a part of the forest that burned only 41 years ago. The new growth of prime young timber below has not even reached maturity. Boston will return with a grim report. He went down to... Did it? No, I haven't. We've got two, two old fighters. Biosault, Biosault. David's on, David's on back end. No. We've got a whole new world coming up. Way out there. Way out there. There's fire right now. We're out to this ridge. Good grief. We're getting down to that Medhau Valley, where this means farms and ranchers and orchards and fruits and cattle and everything else, right? Private property, private homes. We're concerned in here, too. This morning was some of the fire behavior specialists, and we've got a loop on this end line and this opening here, and if we do get the dog-gone thing tied together, we're gonna have to burn here under favorable conditions and burn in a little at a time to make that line safe. An all-out effort is made to check the black canyon blaze. Around 3.30 p.m., men and machines are ordered back. In the following hours, 400,000 trees will be engulfed in flame and die. Battlefield defeat. When a forest dies, one man must be responsible and weigh the cost. The devastation of valuable timberland, a mortal blow to both beauty and economy, the risk of human lives, all are balanced and mourned by fire boss Don Peters. Don, how do you feel when you see fire go over a forest like this? It makes me sick inside. It's hard to say. I've been doing it a long time, but my whole career has been in forestry and we want to raise the trees and use them. When they burn up, nobody likes to see trees or greenery burn. And the worst part of it is you're concerned about men that are off in there, too. I mean for safety. Maybe that's not the worst part of it, but that's one of our big concerns because we've got to know where our men are and we've got to be prepared and everybody has to be trained and they have to follow orders. Well, I'll see you guys. Monday, August 31st. The fires are eight days old. Even while firefighting continues, crews mop up ravaged areas like black canyon. They must turn over every burning log, every inch of soil for smoldering embers, a single spark carried by the wind could ignite another holocaust. Mopping up is regarded by firefighters as perhaps the dirtiest and least desirable assignment on a fire. Yet none argues its necessity, for a burned-out forest is not easily forgotten. 10 a.m. at Alder Lake Base Camp, Don Peters and his aides exude confidence for the first time since the fires began. They've had a break in the weather. The skies over the Mitchell Creek fire are clear. Reports from the field tell of a massive assault by the bombers. Though with some hesitation, Peters even talks of containment. We were in trouble and I said, well, we got that to our knowledge. And I said, if it runs out at the end of it, we're in trouble and if not, maybe it's a long way to live with it. As the big air tankers hit one hot spot after another, converted from their original use in another kind of war, they're flown by pilots who must risk their lives every day during a fire. Under attacks, small spotter planes often lead them in. The chemical they release is a fertilizer which clings to the trees and slows down the progress of fire. It has died red so the pilots can see where they've made their last drop. In the ground, we'll try to close the line before. With greater protection now, the bulldozers make tremendous headway in carving line around the fire. In some cases, more than 50 yards wide, it is the beginning and ending irony of firefighting that to save the forest, you must destroy part of it. P.N. Nearly 60 miles of line, representing many long hours and days in the fire, are complete. The Mitchell Creek fire is surrounded. It's brought to Don Peters at Alderley, at the fires wherever wildfire has come. What remains is only ruin. The forest, primeval, virgin, silent, is now dead. It costs $13 million just to fight the fires. It will cost millions more to try to bring the forest back. But there is no true measuring of what has happened here. Only the sight of 118,000 acres of life now gone. Don Peters has spent a lifetime in the forests. In many respects, he has lived the life that Emerson and Thoreau described for all mankind. In nature, he has sought tranquility. In living things, he has found beauty. In the trees, he has seen the qualities of all living beings. And so, the sense of loss cuts deep. In the scorched remnants of the soil, can be read the story of a thousand years of growth, decimated within seconds. Animals in a wildfire are often burned beyond recognition. Some are caught in the terrible struggle to get away. This tiny squirrel apparently buried his head at that moment when he sensed he could not escape. What is left to Don Peters now at the fight out of his career is only a sense of sorrow, the knowledge of what a poet said nearly 2,000 years ago, that a forest is a long time growing. I hurt inside. I really feel badly because I'm 58 years old now and this area will not come back to where it was in my lifetime. There are just not that many years left that I have to live.