Saludos friends! It has been quite a while since my last post, in this time, I have had quite the eventful few weeks. The rain finally broke, and the clouds drifted away leaving South-Central Colorado exposed to the summer sun’s oppressive drying heat. 

Near the end of June, the record monsoon rain and humidity that lingered over Colorado for months finally broke, leaving the lush green foliage that rapidly grew during this time to cure in the high-desert heat. It started off slowly, the ground still held much moisture, but as the summer matured, the air swelled with heat.

In a matter of weeks, our idyllic, peaceful dispatch office began to receive fire report after fire report, a majority being lightning caused. Even though the moisture left, the high mountain storms did not. These dry storms brought nothing but wind and lightning, exactly the two things needed for fire. On July 19th I was on shift when a lightning bust swept through our northern Pike forest. This bust left our office with 17 single tree fires to manage in the span of 2 hours. Busy would be an understatement, I don’t think i have made so many phone calls in my life, it was constant updates, tie-ins, and reports of new starts with my Forest’s fire crews and duty officers. It was a constant flood of new information that I then had to regurgitate, but, this is exactly the event I was waiting for. Even though it was difficult, this was the exact proof that I needed for myself to show I belong here. Proof that I could manage a plethora of incidents and still keep a level head. 

The summer keeps rolling on by and PIDC has yet to see the big one, the fire to be remembered for years on end, but for now I bide my time being content with the bursts of single tree fires, hoping that I’m on duty when it arrives.