Out of the wilderness, by the thinnest skin of my teeth .. Pinyon Peak Fire Lookout

[PufPuf23]

16. That looks like a CCC era constructed lookout.

Like this:



That is Orleans Mountain Lookout on Six Rivers National Forest. It has not been manned for over 30 years but has been maintained. It is being threated by fire now. Looks very similar in layout to Pinyon Peak. There are very few manned lookouts locally now, several of the old CCC constructed ones were demolished or otherwise removed years ago.

Back in 1977 there was the Hog Fire that burned to the lookout. I was a USFS employee at the time (69-85; timber guy) but was a firefighter (as was everyone able bodied with a red card) on Hog Fire. There is an old CCC track down the backside of the mountain that was widened by Cat and about a 2 mile hose lay with porta tanks to get water to the lookout. We ended up driving up the fire line throwing fusees out at dusk to start a back fire. I hosed down the lookout when the fire line was lit at the lookout.