Texas history, 2011 saw more than 90 percent of the state in severe, extreme or exceptional drought sta- tus. Garry Barney, a regional fi re coordinator with the Texas For- est Service, recently renamed the Texas A&M Forest Service, says, “During the 2011 fi re season we were fi ghting fi res in conditions that we’d never seen before. We had extremely drought stricken areas providing an enormous amount of fuel, nearly zero humidity and gust- ing winds that went on for days.” These ideal meteorological con-
ditions converged with the potential to fuel a massive wildfi re and put the Jacksons on high alert. As it turns out, the pasture where light- ning struck on April 10, 2011, was thick with cedar. The Jacksons had been cutting fence posts from the cedar and using a tree shear on a skid steer, but had not been able to burn the brush piles leading up to the fi re because of the exact situa- tion they now faced: the danger of an uncontrollable fi re. “By the next afternoon the fi re
broke out in that section, and it just had an enormous amount of fuel. In the fi rst few days it burned toward the southern edge of our place and onto the neighbor’s, but it came back on us and we knew it would be tough to put out,” says
Robert Joe. Even though the ranch had the
necessary equipment to successfully fi ght fi res in less severe weather conditions, the dozer, grader and tank truck full of water were no match for a swift moving fi re in such rough terrain. In fact, they put the dozer to
work immediately but had to cease efforts or risk losing it because there was no backup available. Mean- while, intense fires were taking over the exclusive residential area of Possum Kingdom Lake just north- east of the ranch, thus keeping all of the normal fi refi ghting resources and personnel busy and unable to assist at the ranch. Robert Joe says, “The fi re on our
place eventually ran into the Ho- hertz fi re that was burning in Palo Pinto County, and by the time it was all said and done it caught up with the fi re over at Possum Kingdom.”
The daily grind The local volunteer fi re depart-
ment was the fi rst to respond and stayed as the fi re raged on for 3 weeks. The county precincts were there early on with water trucks and motor graders, but when it became evident the fi re would burn exces- sively the Forest Service was able to shift its otherwise diverted and
thin resources and send assistance. But the fi re raged on, and with
conditions primed for a marathon fi refi ght the U.S. Forest Service was called in to aid the control efforts, pulling in equipment and manpow- er from coast to coast. Crews came from as far away as Yellowstone and the Teton Mountain region of Wyo- ming, as well as the Grand Canyon, and even from the southeast region of the country. Still, the fi re continued to gain
momentum and the Forest Service staff was permitted to work only a 12-hour shift. “If they started at 6 in the morning that meant they were done by 6 that evening, regardless of the fi re conditions,” says Robert Joe. With those factors in place, the
bulk of the overnight watch shift and fi refi ghting efforts were left to the family, friends, neighbors and the endless stream of volunteer fi re departments that showed up from across the region. Texas Department of Transpor-
tation machinery was brought in to help the never-ending battle, while oil production companies in the area furnished water in tanker trucks so the fi re trucks didn’t have to leave the ranch. “At one point we had helicopters
called in by the Forest Service, but they couldn’t dip into our tanks because the water levels were too low. After that we didn’t see them on our place much because they were mainly using them to protect structures and homes over at the Possum Kingdom fi re,” says Rob- ert Joe. There was no way to predict how
Dena Jackson says the fi res burned so hot that she could hear rocks exploding in the heat. This shattered rock shows the pink discoloration caused by intense heat.
70 The Cattleman August 2013
long it would burn, and with fi res blazing simultaneously in sever- al parts of the state, the incident commanders from the Texas Forest Service and the U.S. Forest Service changed every few days. “Just when
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