Authors: Joseph Heywood
McKower pulled into the lot the same time he did. There were trucks all over, a red fire pumper at the door, men in yellow Nomex coveralls and green DNR shirts huddled in the parking lot.
“I heard you on the radio,” McKower said. “Look bad?”
“Can’t really tell. Lots of smoke, and the wind is in high-hoot, so it’s probably building fast. I never actually saw any flames, but I sort of mopped up a lit snag to the north. I was with Sedge and the archaeologists between Crisp Point and Vermilion. We had lightning all over the damn place, Lis. It was everywhere.”
“The radios are jammed with traffic,” she said. “Here’s where we’ll pay the price of all agencies not being on the same commo system and over not having enough fire officers. Is Sedge going to evacuate those people?”
“Not unless she needs to. I told her to just hike east on the beach to Vermilion and regroup there. That’s a long way from the fire if it jumps big.”
She said, “Let’s get inside, call the chief, and see what the fire people want us to do.”
“Is there an event commander yet?” he asked.
“Do we have an event yet?”
“Let’s hope not,” he said, but felt down deep they had something ugly taking shape north of them.
• • •
McKower worked the phones and Service sat in front of her computer radio console.
“All right, Chief,” McKower said, flipping on the speakerphone.
“I talked to Wassoon,” Eddie Waco said. “He’s got scouts evaluating the fire as we speak. How far from town is it?”
“Seven or eight miles north,” Service said.
“Tahquamenon State Park?”
“Ten miles east of there.”
“I just heard there’s a fire at the Upper Falls,” the chief reported. “They got right on it.”
Bad bad bad
, Service told himself.
The park’s not that far south of Sedge’s group. How many lightning strikes had there been in that corridor?
“Wassoon has asked the governor to release a couple of Guard choppers—just in case. What’s our role in this?”
“Do what the incident commander needs,” McKower said. “A lot of routine law enforcement work, traffic, notifications, evacs, patrols—all that.”
“If you want people from other districts, go direct to their lieutenants. We’ll tack overtime onto the fire bill. I’ll alert everyone you may call and let them know they are to pitch in. Keep me in the loop as best you can,” Waco said, and hung up.
“Who the hell is Wassoon?” Service asked.
“Do you pay attention to
anything?
Wassoon is Spiggot.”
“No shit?”
I didn’t know he had another name
. Spiggot was the nickname of the State’s wildfire supervisor, a warhorse among fire officers.
Fire Officer Gar Fox stopped at McKower’s cubicle. “It’s lightning, Sleeper Lake, and this one will be a very tough nut—hard as hell to get to. The wind’s pushing it south toward 123. I’m going to put the Incident Command Post at Four Mile Corner.”
“You the incident commander?” McKower asked.
“No, Kerry Brownmine out of Baraga. He’s en route.”
“What do you need from our people?”
“Let’s start with a meeting up at Four Mile. Kerry will run everything from there. We’ll probably have to ’doze a couple of tracks into the fire in order to get on top of it. A statewide 800 line is going in and will be debugged as quickly as we can make that happen. Fire decisions and status will all be done from the CP. Service field office personnel will work phones, back us up and take overflow. Other law enforcement is short of bods. Your people can jump in with traffic control. I’m probably going to preemptively close 123, and we’re thinking about County 407 up to Pine Stump, too. I want as much of this doped out as we can for Brownmine so he can jump right into the dance. We’ll probably also want your guys to escort fire division
commanders on recon runs. Make sure your people draw fire suits. See you at Four Mile.”
“We’re on our way,” McKower said. Her phone rang and she answered. “Okay, that will help. How many?”
She was making notes in her little notebook. “Send them to Four Mile Corner, north of town on 123. The command post will be there. Thanks.”
To Service: “Let’s move. The west side is sending six officers to help spell our people. Let’s get out to Four Mile. This is all going to unroll really, really fast,” she added.
It already seemed to him that it was.
A small woman with pigtails stopped at the cubicle as they stood up. She had two large red canvas bags marked
DNR FIRE
. “Fire suits,” she said. “We had one made special for Sergeant Bryan and it ought to fit you,” she said, flipping the jumpsuit to Service. “There are helmets, harnesses, canteens, and respirators in the big bags. Make sure you turn the stuff back in or it will be on my butt.”
Service looked at his captain. “We supposed to wear these banana suits?”
“It’s your call, but I’d keep it close.”
They walked outside and got into her Tahoe. “Where’s your state vehicle?” she asked.
“Home. We worked a plainclothes deal last Friday.”
“You’ve been here since then?”
“Grand, ain’t it?”
“God, your new woman must be a saint,” McKower said, backing out of her parking spot.
“What’s the radio situation here?” he asked as they headed north into town.
“Mishmash. Our people will stay on the district 800.”
“Special event?”
“Too much trouble. We’ll all use the main one, but try to maintain discipline. I don’t want chitty-chat going on. Please help me enforce it, especially with the younger officers. We’ll monitor 48P911, Luce County’s law channel. It runs through dispatch out of Kinross and works good. Monitor Eighty for Troops out of Negaunee. It’ll be a weird mix complicated by all the fire personnel. No idea what they’ll have. I’m guessing High Band and 800 and God knows what else.” She looked over at him as she raced north. “You all right?”
“I hate fire,” he said.
“Good. Let’s help our fire folks get this sonuvabitch out.”
• • •
They found Four Mile Corner cluttered with dozens of vehicles and all kinds of fire trucks. A mobile command post trailer had been placed on the grass triangle that separated the highway from a grocery store that had gone bust years back, and never come back to life.
“Do you know Brownmine?” Service asked.
“Moved up from the Detroit area, rising star rep. He led the team that got national accreditation for Critical Incident Management. He’s the number-one short-team leader.” McKower looked over at him. “Don’t be so damn skeptical. You don’t have to be born in the damn U.P. to have the inside track on righteousness or competence.”
“I didn’t say that,” Service said.
“You didn’t have to,” she said. “Have you met our new director yet?”
“What new director?”
She laughed at him. “You are one of a kind, Grady. Chief Waco told me he told you about Belphoebe Cheke.”
“Oh yeah,” he said. “Wyoming, wildlife type.”
“Apparently she and the governor know each other.”
“Great—that will help the state.”
“Governor Timms is
your
friend too.”
“Right now she needs all the friends she can get,” Service said. The state was in the economic tank, fiftieth of fifty in most economic categories. The freefall had come on Timms’s watch. Most of it was not her fault, but it had come during her watch, which in politics amounted to the same thing.
Service and McKower stood outside the command trailer as others joined them. There were uniforms of various state law enforcement agencies, and various DNR and federal units, park service, fish and wildlife fire personnel, USFS law enforcement, tribal police from Bay Mills, and DNR specialists checking in: logistics, safety, plans, information/PR—even a financial specialist to help oversee the spending of money the State didn’t have.
Gar Fox raised his hands for silence. “Kerry Brownmine’s coming. Until he’s here, I’ll coordinate. Time’s short. Don’t sit on your damn concerns. Get
everything on the table as soon as possible so we can take it off just as fast. You’re all experienced. National Weather Service is sending us a fire weather guru from somewhere down south.”
“Would that be like Berrien Springs, or are we talking, laahk, way down in Mississippi?” some joker drawled.
“Okay,” Fox said, “knock off the crap. And spare the man any of your half-baked Yooper weather jokes. Let’s do this thing right.”
He began: “The ICP is this trailer. The old store next door will house the Red Cross and Salvation Army, and warehouse donations of clothing and food, tools and miscellany. Any evacuees will be directed to the center being set up at the high school. Mo-Neeka, you here?”
A woman raised her hand. “That’s Mo-Neeka,” Fox said. “She’ll handle accommodations for evacuees. There will also be a place for evacuated animals across the street from the high school. Luce County Animal Control is taking care of that show, up to and including horses and cattle.”
“Moo,” somebody said.
“How big is this thing now?” a voice asked. It was the Luce County sheriff.
“We estimate it’s already at four thousand to seven thousand acres, and it’s got a shitload of fuel above- and belowground. If it gets as big as Seney, we’ll need an army to fight it. Better to plan big and not need it than to plan small and be up shit creek. Other questions?”
None. “When you come to the ICP for daily briefings, don’t park here. Find a place elsewhere. Keep this area open for the incident commander and emergency vehicles. We’ll probably meet twice a day, early morning and again late evening. If you can’t get here, send a rep in your place, and make sure we have a list of your replacements before we break up today.” Fox paused to catch his breath. “I’ve
seen
this fire. ’Dozers will have to surge a couple of roads into the area. You know the drill. Stop it first, then crush it. For now we’re in the stop-it-any-way-we-can phase. Winds are gonna push it toward 123, and that’s where we’re gonna make the first big fight,” he said, and paused for emphasis.
“I don’t need to tell you that the town is south of us, and all those folks expect us to have their backs, and by God, we do and we will. Section chiefs, if you have someone who can’t cut it on their job, get their ass out posthaste. This is neither a training exercise, nor a dress rehearsal. This is the real goddamn deal, ladies and gents. We either produce or we are out, no
hard feelings, and that includes everybody here. The incident commander will designate fire divisions, alpha, bravo, Charlie, and so forth.” Fox turned to McKower, “The IC may want your people to provide personal escort for division chiefs. Got enough people to cover it?”
“Six coming from the west side,” she said. “We’re good. Sarn’t Service will supervise COs, I’ll liaise with the incident commander and other law enforcement at the planning and allocation level. If you need help quickly, go directly to Chief Master Sergeant Service.”
Gar Fox smiled. “Thanks, Captain.”
This said, Fox moved on to the roles of other law agencies, methodically talking to the lead representative of each group, outlining probable duties and priorities, asking about what they needed or wanted. He was calm, rational, organized, and deadly serious.
Jeffey Bryan arrived and Service went to greet him as other CO trucks began pulling in. McKower stayed with Fox.
“Where’s Sedge?” Bryan asked.
“Still east of Crisp at the dig.”
I already told him this. Is he being overly nervous?
“Do we need to get her out of there?”
“Not yet. There’s a twenty-mile gap. If she has to evacuate, I told her to hike east to Vermilion and we’ll recover them there.”
Bryan nodded.
“I’m not taking over for you sergeants,” Service told him. “McKower will work with the short team and I’ll fill in for her with you. I’m not going to micromanage your shit. You know what to do, so do it. When the western guys get here, give them familiarization rides in key areas over key routes, then turn them loose in their own trucks.”
COs were gathering, looking at him expectantly. “This thing may melt into chaos, but it will be
controlled
chaos. Stay calm and help people who need help. Most important, if you need help, ask for it.”
Service’s cell phone vibrated and he stepped away to answer it. “I’m at the corner by the district,” Friday said.
“Come through town north to Four Mile Corner. There are lots of gawkers. Be careful.”
Service walked over to McKower. “A Troop I met earlier tonight nearly hit a bear on 123. This is dense bear country. Make sure Gar tells everyone
the facts. The fire’s gonna have the animals scared and running, and they may be acting stupidly, especially the young males.”
She patted his arm and his phone vibrated again. “Sergeant Service, this is Goldie at the lab.”
“Have we met?”
“No, I’m the dirt guy,” the man said brightly. “That sample you sent over?”
“What about it”
“Not enough. Silica is all I can tell you. Without more to work with, I’m SOL.”
“Silica—like sand?”
“Sort of, yessir, but that’s not why I’m calling. Don’t know if you meant for us to look at this, but you had a fair amount of
Ascalapha odorata
traces in the wooden box.”
It was getting noisy. Service pushed a finger in his open ear. “What did you just say?”
“Black witch.”
Service held the phone away from his ear and stared at it. “Is that like a rock band, or what?”
“No, no, sorry—it’s a giant moth. Some people see it fly at night, which is when it usually flies, and thus they think it’s a bat! Thing has a six-inch wingspan.”
“This is significant?”
“That’s for you to say, sir.
Ascalapha odorata
is native to the Deep South and to the tropics of Central America. On rare occasions they have ventured into the Upper Peninsula. I know of only two places where they’ve been found, but both are well documented and both are in Chippewa County: Vermilion Point, and a couple miles west of there.”
“West toward Crisp Point?”