As a pair of major wildfires burn west and north of Gillette, Wyoming, multiple residents helping fight the Campbell County fires have accused local firefighters of being idle on scene, while the fire department has countered, saying fire-monitoring can look idle when it’s not.
One of the loudest critics of the Campbell County Fire Department is longtime rancher and construction driver Roger Oedekoven, whose Saturday Facebook post urging people to stop donating to the CCFD amassed 135 comments and 115 shares by Monday afternoon.
Numerous commenters echoed the sentiment, while others condemned it as inconsiderate.
In a Monday interview with Cowboy State Daily, Oedekoven reiterated his point.
“Campbell County (firefighters) didn’t lift a finger when we were trying to stop the fire line up against a railroad track,” said Oedekoven. “Didn’t even pull a hose up — they were a mile down the road.”
Oedekoven said the flames were lapping along the grader he was using at the time as he tried to clear a dirt line. A female commander showed up and wanted to back burn, or create a line of burnt vegetation to deter the fire, while 30 mph winds were in play, Oedekoven also claimed.
Oedekoven went out to build fire lines at his own expense after a ranch family with whom he is friends called for his help to save their cows and ranch. He and other private-sector drivers on scene were able to stop the flames from eating the tracks as well, he said.
He credited the Clearmont Fire District as doing a good job, saying its personnel were on scene with fire trucks and “just going to town. They were amazing.”
Direction
It’s not that firefighters are idle, it’s that they have lacked direction, Mark Tromble, private-sector trucking and material superintendent, told Cowboy State Daily on Monday.
“I shouldn’t say Campbell County Fire wasn’t doing what they could. I think they could have been managed a little better,” said Tromble.
He said he saw county personnel grading the barrow ditches near Kingsbury and Montgomery roads rather than building fire lines — even as construction crews rushed to get equipment to the blaze’s perimeter.
“Why in the world they were worried about blading some grass off (there) instead of building fire line with their equipment?” asked Tromble. “Shoot, the fire was 6 miles from them and going the opposite direction.”
Another time, he said he saw federal firefighters sitting beyond a fire, saying they were awaiting permission to fight it.
Tromble said many private construction-rig drivers have volunteered their time and fuel so far.
Like Oedekoven, Tromble wanted to call out one player for a job well done: Campbell County Road and Bridge Director Kevin Geis.
Saved My Home
Gene Thompson, who lives on Coyote Trail, countered the claims about how local firefighters are attacking the situation, saying county firefighters and road and bridge personnel rescued his neighborhood from the flames.
The road and bridge department brought a blade and called in slurry planes. Thompson wasn’t sure if the drivers of two more helpful dozers were from the county or private sector, he said.
The drivers made a roughly 40-foot-wide fire break line along the neighborhood’s private road and “pretty much saved our whole subdivision,” which contains about 100 homes, said Thompson.
The fire has since shifted northward.
“Them firefighters taking care of our area were not being lazy,” he said.
Firefighters stationed in the area about 10 p.m. Wednesday and remained there all night and into Thursday evening.
As soon as day broke Thursday, the county driver bladed a fire break line “in no time at all” through treacherous terrain, said Thompson.
Sometimes it looks like personnel are standing around when they’re watching to ensure the flames consume all the fuel up to a fire break line, he said.
Thompson became emotional when he spoke of the efforts to save his neighborhood.
“I’ve lived here all my life,” he said. “I’ve seen them guys do some extraordinary things.”
Stress And Fatigue
The CCFD did not respond directly to detractors’ claims Monday, but the agency rebutted them in a Saturday press release urging people to understand the firefighters’ position and show patience.
“Firefighters’, landowners’, and locals’ frustrations, stress and fatigue are evident,” says the statement. It says some people have threatened CCFD members on assignment.
Normally, CCFD attacks fires directly, but these wildfires were moving quickly and require “indirect tactics,” says the statement, citing heat, drought and erratic winds.
The county has encountered 103 wildfires this year, with 34 of them in the past 30 days, and has used indirect tactics on five of them, the statement says.
Some personnel are directly engaged with the fire while some are assigned to the road or to blade lines to be ready to chase spot fires from the wind blowing embers across the barren lines.
“This many times can be seen as ‘standing around’ and not helping,” says the statement.
It says water tenders, likewise, are on scene in a readiness capacity, not a firefighting capacity.
CCFD has had to prioritize protecting structures, homes and ranch infrastructures and can’t always fight fires directly.
“We are all working toward the same goal and may not agree on how that should be done, although CCFD is using proven tactics and limited resources,” the statement says.
Firefighting resources are at a critically low level across the nation, and competing with other large wildfires in Wyoming has exacerbated that difficulty in Campbell County, says the release.
Two of the state’s largest wildfires now blazing are in Campbell County — the Flat Rock Fire west of Gillette and the Constitution Fire to the north. The Flat Rock Fire has burned more than 52,000 acres and is 35% contained as of the last estimate reported by the Wyoming State Forestry Division. The Constitution Fire is nearly 25,000 acres and 28% contained.
Because the fires are unpredictable, CCFD “cannot guarantee that all donated resources will be immediately deployed,” says the statement, adding a nod of gratitude for the heavy equipment and water the community has given to the cause. Allocation of those boons is based on urgency of need, the department wrote. The county is also documenting which equipment has been offered “for future reference.”
“Thanks to the combined efforts of private citizens, ranchers, County Road and Bridge, and the CCFD, we have made progress every day towards containing these fires,” the statement concludes.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
