A fire northwest of Bayfield last Friday afternoon could have been much worse if a wildland fire crew hadn't been nearby, Upper Pine Fire Chief Bruce Evans told the Times.
The fire was in dense forest off Osirion Way, about a half mile from Upper Pine Station 6 near the County Road 502/ 228 intersection.
Evans said a wildland crew starts their day at Station 6. Crew boss Brian Crowley "had just returned to Station 6 by Bellflower" subdivision, he said. "That's where they started their day. A boy came riding up on a bicycle and said there was a fire."
The dispatch call went out at 3:37 p.m., shortly after the boy contacted Crowley. Evans said the boy was connected with the fire's start, but he did not give details.
Fortunately, the full wildland crew "was just up the road because a tree took down a power line and there was risk of arcing causing a wildfire," Evans said. "So we were able to put 18 people on the fire within less than a half hour. The Forest Service also responded from Bayfield."
Another item of good fortune was that, "The wind wasn't blowing at the time. We were pretty lucky," Evans said.
The fire was in dense mixed oak and Ponderosa and was "burning pretty good," he said. "They were able to keep it to less than an acre."
But the fire had been moving north from the starting point toward two homes that did not have defensible space around them, Evans said. So the fire "had a lot of potential. If it had burned up to that ridgeline, it would have been a very significant fire."
Responders had the fire under control within 30 minutes to an hour, Evans said, but responders were there for a couple more hours for mop-up.
Upper Pine responders also were busy on Sunday with the high winds.
Upper Pine got around nine calls that day related to downed power lines at Vallecito and on CR 243, and a blown electrical transformer in Bayfield.
There was a downed power line in the 100 block of Hope Road, another on Decker Drive near Grimes Creek, two separate lines down in the 6100 block of CR 243 near Lemon reservoir, and a blown transformer on La Plata Road near Upper Pine Station 1 in Bayfield.
Much of the north end of Vallecito was without power for much of Sunday evening, Evans said. "It was kind of crazy," he said.
According to a news release from La Plata Electric Association, downed trees and branches caused numerous scattered electrical outages Sunday afternoon, affecting almost 700 customers in around 20 separate locations.
"The winds affected approximately 2,000 additional customers with temporary 'blinks' as the system in various areas temporarily cut power in a preventative safety measure," the news release said. "When the system detects no problem on the line, power will automatically be restored."
Weather-related incidents also affected customers in southern La Plata and Archuleta counties, with around 50 customers losing power in separate outages.
It was around 3 a.m. Monday before all the power was restored in the scattered locations, according to LPEA.
