The cause of a fire at one of the tallest coastal Douglas fir trees in the world is still under investigation.
The Doerner Fir Tree in Oregon’s Southern Coast Range is black from its bottom to its top following a mysterious fire first reported in its canopy in mid-August. Investigators ruled out lightning strikes. Now, they say there is a possibility that the fire was human-caused. The area and the trail leading to the tree remain closed.
What is more certain is that the old growth fir has likely lost its status as a giant. The fire in its canopy dropped its height from 325 feet closer to 280. But local and regional arborists and tall tree climbers are part of the reason this massive tree is still standing at all.
Luke Colvin, owner and operator of Arbor Care Tree Specialists based in Astoria, travelled with his friends and fellow arborists Damien Carré and Logan Collier to inspect the tree on Aug. 21 after earlier efforts to douse the fire with water from above failed. Fire hotspots persisted inside a cavity in the trunk, 280 feet up, frustrating traditional wildland firefighting efforts.
Firefighters established containment lines and water hoses around the base of the massive tree, but were looking for options to deal with hotspots and potential fire in its trunk. In other circumstances, crews may have considered falling the tree, but the Doerner Fir is a special case for many reasons, said Greg Diemel, a spokesperson for the federal Bureau of Land Management which owns the land where the fir is located.
Estimated to be between 450 and 500 years old and a member of a species that could live for several hundred years more, the Doerner Fir is significant historically, culturally and environmentally. Its diameter stretches for 11.5 feet. A trail runs by it, making it one of Oregon’s more accessible old growth trees. Also the sheer size of the fir tree meant dropping it would be a daunting and potentially dangerous prospect.
“The intent was always to save the tree at all possible costs,” Diemel said. “It was just how were you going to do that and get a fire 280 feet up in the air…how were you going to get it dead out?”
So BLM and the Coos Forest Protective Association, which is charged with woodland fire protection in that area, turned to arborists, including some who had climbed the Doerner Fir more than a decade before.
Carré, owner of Oregon Tree Care in Portland, has climbed a lot of tall trees in his life, including the Doerner Fir before the fire. He was part of the group Ascending the Giants that established the Doerner Fir’s status as one of the tallest coastal Douglas firs in the world. But he had never before ascended a tall tree to try to possibly put out a fire.
On Aug. 21, with Colvin managing operations from the ground, Carré and Collier made the ascent. Drones flown by other responders scoped out the tree both visually and to register hotspots as the arborists figured out where to set their lines.
Carré went first as lead climber and was the one who climbed all the way up to the cavity. He scraped out ash and any remaining embers and then helped bring a hose up to the top to dump even more gallons of water into the tree. Then he placed a sprinkler system so all of this work didn’t need to be repeated if fire broke out again in the following days. He was back on the ground by the late afternoon.
The whole experience was highly unusual for the arborists, Colvin said. For the fire to end up in the cavity in the first place “there had to have been a set of specific sequence of events.”
“But,” Colvin added, “the fact that the fire ended up in the world’s tallest Douglas fir is just—the odds are astronomical. Unfortunately, it happened, and we were honored to be part of the solution—and thankfully we ended up actually being part of the solution. The tree will almost certainly…survive and most likely outlive both of us.”
He and Carré said there was no question in their minds when they got the call: They were going to do what they could to help save the Doerner Fir.
For firefighters, the Doerner Fire Tree fire provided some important lessons. One of them was that they might be able to call on arborists to help. Another was that it is possible to pull water from a portable tank on the ground and bring it up several hundred vertical feet while maintaining pressure.
Brett Weidemiller of the Coos Forest Protection Association said it’s a stretch to think he’ll face these exact circumstances anytime soon—a protected fire raging 280 feet up in the trunk of one of the tallest living Douglas firs—but, he said, “there are definitely lessons learned if it happens again.”
While he was climbing the Doerner Fir and working at the cavity, Carré was focused on the task at hand and on staying safe. When it was over, he had more time to feel the weight of what had happened to the tree.
“I just think it’s really sad,” he said. “I’m a tree guy, I cut a lot of trees down, right?”
Often, it’s to mitigate the risk for a home or other structures. “But,” he continued, “I’ve always felt, no matter what, leave the ancient trees alone. Leave the old groves alone.”
Now Carré worries that the loss in height because of the fire could diminish interest in the Doerner Fir and, therefore, diminish protection for it and the other large trees that surround it.
Diemel told KMUN it isn’t clear what will happen to the tree yet.
“We’re watching and waiting, to be honest,” he said. There are fall and winter storms the tree will need to weather in its new fire-weakened state.
But, Diemel said, speaking to Carré’s concerns, “It’s still one of the biggest coastal Douglas firs out there.”