RHH's photos with the keyword: booth hill

There are several reasons for posting this photo, taken from the top of Booth Hill, the highest point in our area at 898 meters. The first reason has to do with the wildfire, the Gray Fire, that destroyed so many acres and homes here recently. The facility in the foreground is Lakeland Village, a residential home for handicapped persons and the place our son lives. The fire, as is evident from the photo, burned right up to Lakeland, but the firefighters managed to prevent the fire from burning any of the buildings on the grounds. The fire then burned to the left of the photo and into the city of Medical Lake destroying many homes. The second reason for posting this is that we learned in connection with the fire that buildings at the top of the hill, almost all of which were destroyed by the fire, were part of an old Nike surface-to-air missile site, built during the Cold War. The missiles were sited there to protect nearby Fairchild Air Force Base, still operational and for that reason the ill is also known as Nike Hill. Though the site has long been abandoned by the military, the buildings were still in use by the family that owned the property and used it to restore and sell old cars.

This hill, known as Booth Hill or Nike Hill, is the highest point in our area. The wildfire that swept through the area recently, the Gray Fire, started in the wheat fields to the southwest of the hill, burned up over the hill and headed for Lakeland Village, a facility for handicapped persons. The firefighters saved Lakeland, but the fire went around it and burned to the northeast into the city of Medical Lake where nearly 200 homes were destroyed. The fire also destroyed the communications towers, a junkyard of old cars and te buildings at the top of Booth Hill, though by the time this photo was taken the communications facilities had already been rebuilt.

I've posted some other photos of the wildfire that ravaged our area, burning 10,000 acres and over 200 homes. Our own was spared as was the facility where our son lives, but the area will not be the same in our lifetimes. This photo was taken at Booth Hill near the fire's origin and shows how hot the fire was, melting metal on some of the old cars that were on the hill.

We had an exciting day yesterday. We have been very hot and dry (no rain for three months) and have been worried about fires. Noticed smoke to the west and north of us and went to find out what was happening. A wildfire had started on the west side of Booth Hill, shown here and burned up and over the hill, burning the cell phone tower and communications facility on the hill as well. When I first saw the fire it was burning down the hills toward the facility where our handicapped son lives. I could not access the facility but was assured by a policeman that the facility was being evacuated and went way around through the town of Medical Lake to find where our son was. In the town discovered that winds had whipped up the fire and it was already on the outskirts of town, After finding and speaking to our son at another facility, Eastern State Hospital, where he had been evacuated, I went around to the west and south of the fire and arrived back home only to discover that we were under and evacuation order and had to get out. We already had some things ready to go, loaded the car and are now in Spokane waiting to get back home, who knows when. The fire burned part of the town of Medical Lake and many home and other structures to the east. The facility where our son lives was spared and no one was injured there. Our home and the neighborhood we live in were also spared, but at least one person has died in the fire and many are displaced or now homeless. The Interstate Highway, I90 is closed and so are the roads in our area.