Imperial Valley press., 1922-07-07
Three Million Dollars in
Damages Reported as
Fires Spread
CITY'S WATER CUT OFF
Auto and Railway Traffic
Blocked Burning Snags
and Bridges
United Press Leased Wire

SEATTLE, Wash, July 7. - Two
known dead and six missing, hundreds
of thousands of dollars worth of homes
+ and mills destroyed and more than
81 100000 worth of timber is the toll
which has already been exacted by re-
lentless forest and brush fires raging
in an almost unbroken chain in western
Washington from British Columbia to
the Columbia river.
So serious has the situation become
that leading operators have decided to
cease logging and turn all forces to fire
fighting.
The dead are Jack Clifford and Ern-
est Layland, who died from burns suf
fered when their homes on Vancouver
Island, B. c., were destroyed
Ten homes were burned at Merville,
Vancouver island, when a change of
wind brought the flames into the
soldier settlement at that place. Sew
eral Merville residents are missing.
B. G. Town Escapes Destruction
Brush fires which threatened to de-
stroy Nanaimo, b. c., are reported
under partial control, but the flames
have cut off the citys water supply,
TeHutTlHS SERIOUS.
The most serious forest fire in Wash
ington at present is near Eatonvillc,
where a blaze along a mile front is out
of control and threatening the largest
tract of virgin Douglas fir left on the
coast. The flames are travelling up
Lynch creek, west of Rainier National
park.
Only Rain Will Save Forests
PORTLAND, Ore, July Rain
alone will check forest fires raging in
four sections of the Pacific Northwest,
lumbermen here agreed today The
weather bureau has checkmated this
hope by holding. out little promise for
a break in the long dry spell
Oregon fires, which SO far have done
approximately $2,000,O00 damage to
mills, timber and railroad property
within the last three days centered to-
day in Tillamook country, where fire
on 20 mile front, flanked by smaller
conflagrations, is making it's way into
virgin stands of timber said to be the
finest in the northwest.
Railroad, lumber and government
forces have been fighting this blaze
without success. Fire areas are spread
ing despite the employment of every
known means of checking them.
Whole Valley Inferno of Flame :
In Southwestern Washington, the
Coweeman valley is veritable inferno.
with the flames spreading on both sides
of that river and steadily working
toward the Kalama river and greater
tracks of green timber.
Practically every fire in the section
is a ground fire, burning in under
growth, eating out the bases of great
snags and dropping them across rail
road tracks and highways. Automobiles
report intense discomfort when travers-
ing roads in the Coweeman and Tilla-
nook regions. Trains in the Oregon
fire zone are being delayed repeatedly
because of threatened trestles. Scores
of squatters cabins and small logging
camps have been burned.
Campers and Loggers Blamed
Campers who fail to put out their
campfires and loggers who allow slash.
ing fires to get away from them into
dry underground were generally
blamed.
cit s generally a bad season. G. c..
Scott, head of the Timbermen 3 Patrol
association, told the United Press.
''Fires lit during the normal slashing
fire period spread because of the lack
of usual rain late in June and early in
July. It s nobody 8 fault particularly.
The situation is bad but by no means
hopeless.
The lack of air patrols, shch as those
furnished by the United States govern
ment during the last fire season, was
blamed by several lumbermen. L. A.
Nelson, secretary of the West Coast
Lumbermen 8 association, declared that
radio connections with ranger head
quarters by planes constantly patroll-
ing the country aided materially in
checking fires before they spread.
"Plain carelessness is what is burn
ing up dollars in the northwest today, !"
ne declared