Three More Buildings Confirmed Lost in Big Creek Fire

As crews get a handle on the Big Creek Fire near Emigrant in the Paradise Valley, fire officials have confimed at least three more buildings burned in the fire's weekend blowup.

Earlier reports showed just six buildings -- three of them homes -- burned in the fire, but new aerial reports show at least three more, said fire information officer Marilyn Krause. There's no word yet on what kind of buildings the other three were.

With the help of cooler temperatures Monday and Tuesday, the fire is holding at 12,000 acres and crews have line around 20 percent of the fire. That 20 percent is primarily from secure lines holding well on the south and southeastern "horseshoe" between the 50 or so threatened homes and the fire.

New Air Ambulance Service Set to Debut

Each time I hear LifeFlight hovering over Missoula’s St. Patrick Hospital as it heads toward what I image to be some heart-wrenching medical emergency, I cringe. It’s been two years since Gunnar’s accident and the sound still rattles me.

When Gunnar fell 70 feet in the Bitterroot’s Kootenai Canyon, he landed on his heels just inches away from a pile of sharp rocks. Within a half hour — thanks to another climber’s cell phone — a nearby field was transformed into a make-shift landing pad.

After 40 agonizing minutes on Highway 93, I arrived at the hospital just as Gunnar was heading into surgery. And despite shuddering screams lurching from his broken body, the doctor said he was going to be OK. LifeFlight, he added, had made all the difference.

So when I recently heard that Missoula would soon have two air ambulances, I thought: Great. The more the better. And according to Dale Dallman, manager of emergency services at Missoula’s Community Medical Center, whose CareFlight will begin operations on Oct.3, that’s precisely how Missoulians should view the situation.

Others, like LifeFlight Chief Nurse Larry Peterman, are wary.

Hot Shots Working to Keep Rockin’ Complex Out of Drainage

Cool, relatively wet weather Monday held down the Rockin' Fire burning near Lake Como in the Bitterroot National Forest, but crews were expecting some action Tuesday as temperatures increase and humidity drops.

The fire was still mapped at 3,500 acres Tuesday with officials waiting for a new count. It is not threatening any structures.

The Helena Hot Shots are planning to work Tuesday on securing lines along the Rock Creek Trail west of the lake to keep the fire from jumping into the Rock Creek drainage south of the fire. Meanwhile, helicopters are getting in to do water drops on the east flank of the fires.

A Type II Incident Command team is now in place. In a release Tuesday morning, commander Stan Benes said, “Our strategy on this fire is to confine and contain. We want to be able to use our resources where it is safe and feasible to contain the fire.�

So far, there are about 50 people on the fire and two helicopters on hand.

Earthquake!

At about 10:15 pm, I was having a chat with sbpoet in her living room, when the room began to shake and a large armoire began to sway. Ms. poet was convinced it was nocturnal rambunctiousness on the part of her cats and dogs, but I -- having lived in Los Angeles for three years and never actually experienced one -- was convinced it was my first earthquake. A quick visit to the National Earthquake Information Center confirms it: at 10:08 PM MDT, a magnitude 5.6 earthquake hit near Dillon.

Earthquake Shakes My House At Least

Anybody else feel that? I thought for sure my bedroom was moving. I checked under the bed for random animals that may have scurried into shake my house. Then, my Mom called, "Did you just feel that?" My mom is in Great Falls.

Yep. An earthquake. Word is it was felt here in Missoula, in Helena and apparently really shook Great Falls. It woke my Grandma Virgina up anyway. And let me tell you, that's a chore.

Floating the Ruby in the Name of Access

I'll be doing a second float this weekend (click here to read about the first) and this one, on Sunday, is in a different river basin, and the crowd will be much smaller than at Saturday's Milltown-to-Downtown event, and the issues at hand have not, unfortunately, been so fruitfully resolved. With luck, Sunday's float on the Ruby River (not far from Butte, but on the other side of the Continental Divide) will be a celebration of one of the things that makes Montana great - the law guaranteeing all citizens access to the state's rivers and streams.

Floating the Ruby for a Cause

For nearly a decade now landowners and sportsmen have been fighting over access to the Ruby River in Southwestern Montana - a dispute that came to the fore recently following an ill-advised letter from media mogul (and Ruby Valley ranch owner) James C. Kennedy to the University of Montana Foundation. Now Tony Schoonen, a long-time stream access advocate, and Jackie Corr, a Butte writer and political activist, are organizing "Montana Public Stream Access Float Day" on the Ruby for July 17. Floaters will put in at one of two disputed access points on the Ruby and float to Jesson Park in Twin Bridges. It promises to be an interesting day; for more information contact Corr at , or Schoonen at 406-782-1560.

Dasen Bid for Bail Denied Bail

Richard A. "Dick" Dasen, the one-time Flathead Valley business leader who was convicted last month on felony charges of sexual abuse, prostitution and promotion of prostitution, will remain in the Flathead County Jail, at least until his sentencing July 18.

Dasen's attorney, George Best, filed a motion to have Dasen released pending sentencing, citing among other reasons his client's need for daily exercise due to heart problems. Prosecutors have repeatedly said that Dasen is a flight risk and a threat to the community and should remain incarcerated, and on Wednesday, following a procession of witnesses called by Best and the prosecution, Judge Stewart Stadler agreed with them.

Dasen Found Guilty on Five Felony Charges

Kalispell businessman Richard A. Dasen was found guilty Friday of one misdemeanor and five felony charges, including promotion of prostitution and sexual abuse of children, and was led off in handcuffs pending sentencing. He was acquitted of seven other charges, including two of the most serious - sexual intercourse without consent and aggravated promotion of prostitution. Dasen was accused of luring numerous women and girls, many of them methamphetamine addicts, into sex-for-money transactions with payments totalling more than a million dollars over many years.

The verdict virtually assures that Dasen will serve significant time in prison, though Judge Stewart Stadler will have considerable discretion in sentencing, which is set for July: the sexual abuse count can carry a penalty of up to 100 years but has no mandatory minimum. At the same time, the acquittals indicate that the jury agreed with the defense that some of the witnesses were not credible, and in fact were preying upon a man portrayed as generous to an extreme fault.

Dasen’s Fate Now in Jury’s Hands

	Richard A. Dasen (right) with his attorney, George Best at an earlier court hearing.

The Kalispell courtroom was crowded Thursday, tense in anticipation of the final day of the Dick Dasen trial. Connie Guzman, whose daughter, now dead in a car crash, was a "Dasen girl", sat in the back. She’d been subpoenaed as a witness and thus barred from the courtroom until now. An entire front row was reserved for the members of a high school class. The television news people who have been here everyday for the past three weeks stood in the corner that has become their home. There was fearsome energy, tamped by a long wait outside the locked doors of the courtroom, a wait where people mingled in a divided room, with Dick Dasen and his family and friends mostly taking the side by the elevators and everyone else revolving around but not entering that space.

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