Dispatch, Big Sur, Los Padres National Park, California – Part III

--6/30/08 7:00ish am
So the line we dug yesterday? The plan is to line it out with hose, with pumps at both anchor points. But doing all of this has a 5% chance of working if the fire reaches it. We have yet another new supervisor who is a Hot Shot and thinks the idea is stupid, especially since apparently they haven’t been able to hold a hand line since the first started, AND the fire has managed to jump dozer lines that are four blades wide. It’s hard to judge how things are going because all the action is on the other side of the mountain. But I guess things are getting worse. The fire is growing, I know that much – 40,000 acres.

I don’t have to wear my chaps or Siggs today, I’m gonna be so spoiled.

Our crew is definitely the coolest group of guys ever. Everyone is so nice and willing to help one another. I adore Paul, he’s hilarious and a great squad boss. JT is also really awesome and sets the bar really high as far as crew bosses go. I mean, sure, it’s my first dispatch, but I can’t imagine everyone is as great as this crew. All of the members are totally chill, too. Everyone has a great sense of humor and they’re all really interesting. Everyone has a different story.

--8:00ish pm
So we ended up going up to the house from yesterday but we just waited around. We were gonna lay hose, but the supervisor nixed the idea. Instead, we cut, swamped and dug line underneath three bridges. That was a bit of a pain, but it’s got to be done I guess.

While we were driving back to camp, we passed a few places where the first crested the ridges of the mountains and it was coming down toward the road. It seems to have made a big push today and it’s actually backing down the mountains now.

--7/1/08
It’s July 1st. I called Chris yesterday for his birthday, talked to him for a bit. Poor guy – when I called him before we loaded up in the morning, I woke him up and then when I called him after we were off the clock, he was about to go to bed. Sorry, bro.
Today is also Day 7, the halfway point. It’s surprising and odd – the days go by pretty quickly but the week itself seems to move slow. I can’t believe it’s only halfway over. It feels like it’s been a lot longer.

I have to admit, I am starting to feel the wear a little bit, both physically and mentally (more so mentally). I’m a little surprised that I don’t feel very sore every morning. At Surf, I would always wake up feeling like a Mac truck hit me. But that hasn’t happened, with work or dispatch. It’s nice, to say the least, because it makes working a little easier. But yeah, mentally I think I’m starting to feel a little strained. I want to stay positive and, for the most part, I am. I can tell I’m starting to break a little, though. Yesterday, I got a little snippy with Nick and Patrick on the ride back to camp. I also feel frustrated because I haven’t been doing as well as I’d like. I’m still really slow and weak on the hiking and sometimes I’ll be super klutzy at swamping and it’ll just piss me off. I’ll feel myself get more aggressive with throwing slash and stuff.

I hate feeling week and I really hate walking along and fearing every step. I’m exaggerating but it really is stressful to always feel like my footing is unsure and unstable. I have yet to find a way to resolve this issue. I’ll try going slower but then I fall behind and hold up the rest of the line. Blah. I guess there isn’t much I can do but keep trying. I just feel helpless and a bit pathetic. I don’t like being a bad swamper, I don’t want to be a bad swamper.

In other news, fire info: 47,000 acres, 1300+ working on the fire. We cleared out under two more bridges today and it was a little more treacherous than the last few times. JT took each of the squads to a little waterfall to chill for a few minutes. That was nice of him. Harrison and Malcolm jumped in, but the rest of us didn’t. I would have, except I didn’t want to spend the rest of the work day in wet underwear under my Nomex.

I’ve acquired some awesome scratches on my arms and face as the result of being a swamper. Not gonna lie, it would be pretty cool if some of them scarred. But they’re all superficial scratches.

I think I bruised my foot, right on the knuckle of my big toe. I can’t figure out what I did, though it’s probably from climbing. It hurts to walk because emy boot creases right up against it.

--7/2/08
So last night as I was getting ready for bed, you could see backing fires up on the ridges. It was really cool to see, I wanted to keep watching but I desperately needed sleep.

Fire stuff: 52,000 acres, 1500+ people working the fire. It’s 3% contained, but what that means is just that the fire may not have reached the lines yet. There are dozer lines everywhere but the fire has yet to burn up to it, so it can’t be considered contained.

Today is Day 8, six left to go. Everything is yellow because of the smoke, it’s really bizarre. It’s like there’s a camera filter over the sun or like I’m wearing tinted sunglasses.

--7/3/08
Last night, coming back to camp, you could see backing fires along the ridge lines. So the fires have crested the ridges and are now on the way down toward us.

Yesterday was rough, it was my breaking point. We cut and dug line down a hill yesterday (or, at least, we started it). It had to be super wide and it was a really steep hill. I already get frustrated at my frequently unstable footing, so that just put me on the edge. Every step I took, I felt like I was going to plummet to my death. It felt awful. We were also moving way too fast for my comfort.

So this morning, Steakly came up to me before we loaded up and told me that Eric would be swamping for Patrick today. He asked how I felt about it, I said that I was still good to swamp and that yesterday was rough just because the terrain shocked me so much. But he and JT said that they wanted to give me a break. So we hiked up to another spot to continue our line building. I was still swamping, but to help the saw team, not as a sawyer’s swamper.

I was pissed. It made me feel like they thought I couldn’t hack it. And it really made me get down on myself for breaking yesterday. I just felt like they were all, “Well, thanks for trying but …” I’m by no means an awesome swamper, but I thought I had demonstrated that I was doing everything I could and that I could hold my own.

So I just jumped around and swamped for different teams most of the time. Eventually, I was helping Eric with Patrick because he’s not used to swamping for him. Then Eric said he had to take a bit of a break. So I kept swamping for Patrick from a distance (I didn’t have any chaps on) and waited for Eric to be ready to go again. At one point, Patrick needed to refuel his saw so I went over to where Eric was resting to grab some of the Siggs. He had Steakly and Paul with him and his pack was off. He really wasn’t feeling well and he didn’t look so good either. As I grabbed the one Sigg, Paul handed a pair of chaps to me. So I snapped them on and jumped back in.

I hate to admit it but the break was nice – I managed to hike up without much difficulty because my pack was lighter than normal. I felt really good and I wasn’t tired when I had to be Patrick’s swamper again. I was definitely concerned about Eric. But I was also glad to be back in my normal role. It turns out that Eric was really dehydrated and hadn’t had much of an appetite lately. He went to the hospital, got an IV in him and he should be okay.