SHUTDOWN

Most contract loggers did a good job complying with the Forest Service Timber sale contract.   Now and then there was always the temptation to cut some corners and save time as time was money.    During the peak logging season Forest Service contract administrators could be stretched thin depending on their work load.   Some loggers knew this based on how many visits the administrator made to their operation during a week.   Some timber sales required more of our time than others depending on how complex the sale was.   For example, a thinning sale could take much of the administrator’s time with approving tractor skid trails or skyline corridor layout, landing locations and marking additional trees to be cut for these authorized clearings.   Sometimes an entire day could be spent on a thinning sale.    On the other hand a large clear cut unit might only be visited once a week just to check on progress or meet with the logging supervisor or contract logger to agree on a new landing location or spur road for the next unit to be logged.  

One such case happened on the Orleans Ranger District in the summer of 1975 when I approved a landing location and a 200 foot spur road to access a clear-cut unit on a sale purchased by Sierra Pacific Industries out of Arcata, California.   The contract logger was V & K Logging from Happy Camp.    The next day I returned to this sale unexpected to see what progress had been made.  To my amazement the spur road and landing had been constructed as agreed to and yarding was in progress.     Being in fire season I got suspicious that all the required fire equipment may not have been in its proper place.   In addition to having a 500 gallon fire truck, this contract had a requirement for 300 gallon water tank with pump and hose line to be attached to the skyline carriage in the event of a fire in the unit.   To move this tank from one unit to the next they usually drained it to make it easy to transport.   I wondered if it had been filled with water during this move, so I made my way across the busy landing to where the tank had been placed out of the way of the operation.   As I made my way toward the tank all eyes of the landing crew watched me, including the loader operator and yarder engineer.   Sure enough the tank was empty.   I made eye contact with the yarder engineer and ran my index finger across my throat informing him to shut it down.    He blew a long whistle to inform the rigging crew that operations were shutdown.   After shutting down the yarder and loader they told me they were going to fill it at the end of the day after getting the daily quota of log trucks loaded.   They knew from experience that once they were shut down only the Forest Supervisor could permit operations to resume, so they all got in their vehicles and returned to Happy Camp.  By the time I got back to the office the entire world knew of the shutdown, including the District Ranger, Sierra Pacific Industries (SPI) and the Forest Supervisor.    After a meeting of upper management of both parties with insurances by SPI that there would be full compliance with the all fire precautionary provisions of the contract operations were allowed to resume.