Black Butte residents forced out by blaze.

Byline: From Register-Guard and news service reports

SISTERS - Firefighters ordered the evacuation of the 4,000 to 5,000 people in the Black Butte Ranch resort and subdivision west of here Sunday after stiff winds from the northwest fanned the Cache Mountain fire.

Two structures were confirmed destroyed in the complex, which is made up of a lodge, about 1,300 homes and two golf courses. Not all of the residences are occupied year-round.

Gov. John Kitzhaber invoked the Conflagration Act on Sunday evening, which allows firefighters to be sent from other regions to help. More than 300 firefighters were on the fire, said Kristin Bail of the Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center.

Crews thought the ranch was out of danger earlier Sunday, but late afternoon brought wind gusts of up to 35 mph, Bail said. The winds were causing spot fires in and around the ranch.

The lightning-caused fire broke out on Wednesday and had burned about 3,300 acres by midday Sunday.

The Red Cross set up an evacuation center for Black Butte residents at Skyview Middle School in Bend.

Transportation officials closed Highway 20 between Santiam Junction and west of Sisters. The highway is expected to remain closed until at least Tuesday. Motorists are advised to use Highway 58 or Highway 26 instead.

Structure-fire engines were protecting the Black Butte homes in greatest peril, and at least two homes were saved Sunday, Bail said.

The initial order was to evacuate only the Golf Homes section of the combination resort-residential subdivision, but dispatch center spokeswoman Lisa Clark said orders to evacuate everything quickly followed. Black Butte general manager Loy Helmley said the evacuation was `very orderly.'

It's going to be a few days before residents can return, he predicted.

`Between 2 o'clock and 3 o'clock the smoke went from white to billowing and black,' Black Butte resident Jill Click said. The evacuation order came at about 4 p.m.

`It seemed to happen very quickly. Many folks were caught by surprise,' said Bonnie Lippitt of the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center. She said winds blew the fire into the northwest corner of the development.

Camp Caldera, a summer art camp a mile northwest of the fire, was not threatened. The fire was moving away from the camp and its 40 campers.

Meanwhile, three firefighters were killed and two others injured early Sunday when a U.S. Forest Service wildland fire engine patrolling the perimeter of a wildfire in the Klamath National Forest drove off a logging road in the dark and rolled 800 feet down a mountainside.

The engine crew, based in the Lassen National Forest in Susanville, Calif., was helping to watch over a 500-acre backfire set during the night to help contain the 1,350-acre Stanza fire, 10 miles south of Happy Camp, when one wheel went off the narrow gravel road at about 1:30 a.m. and the truck plunged down the steep slope, said Forest Service Incident Commander Howard Carlson.

The green crew-cab pickup equipped with a 500-gallon water tank came to rest on its top in an old clearcut, where members of a Forest Service firefighting crew out of Kentucky who witnessed the crash and Hotshot crews from the Plumas and Eldorado national forests were able to reach the survivors.

The deaths brought to 14 the number of firefighters killed this summer as wildfires continue to rage across the West.

The dead were identified as Steven Oustad, 51, of Westwood, Calif.; Heather DePolo, 29, of Redding, and John Self, 19, of Susanville.

Ryan Smith, 20, and Alex Glover, 19, both of Susanville, were airlifted to Mercy Medical Center in Redding, where Smith was in intensive care and Glover was stable, Carlson said.

After the wreck, Carlson pulled all but a skeleton crew of firefighters into fire camp to assure their safety, but then put them back on the line at about noon.

A memorial service to honor the dead was planned for this evening in fire camp, located at Happy Camp Elementary School.

The crash was being investigated by the California Highway Patrol, as well as regional and national teams from the Forest Service.

Also Sunday, a sprawling wildfire also continued to threaten the Columbia River port town of The Dalles. The fire singed another 3,000 acres overnight and burned to within inches of some buildings but had not destroyed any homes.

`The fire is continuing to pose serious control problems,' as gusty winds periodically kick up the flames, said Peg Foster, an Oregon Department of Forestry information officer.

Crews had the Sheldon Ridge fire about 55 percent contained, she said.

Residents of 250 homes have been urged to evacuate since the lightning-started fire flared Thursday.

Stiff winds whistling through the Columbia River Gorge pushed the fire toward high-tension Bonneville Power Administration electrical wires overnight, Foster said.

The wires were still live Sunday, but if carbon-rich smoke thickens around the cables, it could cause the electricity from the lines to arc, endangering firefighters. If that danger intensifies, she said, authorities might switch them off and reroute power.

Four heavy lift choppers swooped and hovered over the fire, dipping underslung buckets into a pond below and then dumping the water to help quench the flames.

One helicopter pilot had to deal with more than fire Saturday afternoon, reporting that a person on the ground pointed a rifle at him as he hovered over a pond.

The Wasco County sheriff's office arrested Rocky Wade Bratner, 47, on charges of menacing and pointing a gun.

Fire managers said their strategy Sunday was to contain the wildfire using 66 fire engines. The Dalles was not considered threatened.

A contingent of 125 Oregon National Guard troops arrived Saturday to help about 650 firefighters.