Damper weather helps to slow fire.

Byline: Bill Bishop The Register-Guard

SISTERS - After more than doubling overnight Thursday to 24,000 acres, the B and B Complex fire slowed a bit Friday - growing little more than 1,000 acres - under a cloudy sky and cooling rain, giving firefighters a jump on building control lines to protect developed areas on the fire's eastern edge.

It was no comfort to Linda Pyle, a Camp Sherman woman ordered to evacuate her home the day before along with 300 other residents.

"We lost our home," she said, sitting teary-eyed outside a Red Cross shelter in Sisters, pondering a phone call she'd just received from her husband, Chuck - a volunteer firefighter - saying the fire was running fast toward Camp Sherman. She'd heard other rumors of fire spoiling the idyllic hamlet northwest of Sisters.

Seeking peace of mind, she crossed town to the fire camp information center, where she learned it was all a mistake. The fire remained nearly four miles from Camp Sherman, at least for the moment.

"I feel relieved now that I've talked to them," said Pyle, who planned to spend the night in a Bend motel.

It likely will be several days before Pyle and other residents will be allowed to return to Camp Sherman, fire information officer Don Ferguson told her. Highway 20 remains closed between its junction with U.S. Highway 22 eastward to the entrance to Black Butte Ranch. It's not likely to reopen soon.

Also, state transportation officials are discouraging use of the scenic but winding McKenzie River Highway, state Highway 242, especially for motorists in a hurry.

Friday's rain was no turning point for the fire. Only one-tenth of an inch of rain fell, with the greatest benefit being lower temperatures and higher humidity. The two fires comprising the B and B Complex will remain a threat for a long time, Ferguson said.

"Three days from now, the woods aren't going to know this rain fell," he said. "We will gain no more than a day or two from this."

But firefighters made the most of it Friday, burning out fire lines next to roads on the south and east sides of the Booth Fire, the southernmost of the two blazes in the complex and the one threatening Camp Sherman and, to a lesser degree, Black Butte.

Ironically, Black Butte residents are buffered from the B and B Complex by thousands of acres burned over by fires in 2002 and earlier this year that threatened the 1,300-home development.

"Rather than be alarmed, they are alert," Ferguson said.

For Camp Sherman residents, who live within a few miles of a vast stretch of timber killed in a massive beetle infestation over the past several years, it was never a question of whether the tinder-dry landscape would ignite - only when. The fire's cause is still under investigation.

About 1,000 campers have been displaced since the fire exploded Tuesday along Highway 20 over Santiam Pass. At least 20 campgrounds remain closed as the Labor Day weekend approaches.

At the popular campsites around Suttle Lake, the mosaic pattern of a wildfire played out fully along a mile-long stretch of road.

Along the lake, tall Ponderosa pines stand as they have for decades - unscathed. Uphill 200 yards the ashen ground holds limbless black spikes that point to the smoky gray sky. Charred wood and rock, loosened by fire, have rolled downhill to litter the roadway.

Nearby, the fire bypassed a stand of knee-high saplings standing on a hillside the size of a baseball diamond.

Standing on U.S. Forest Service Road 12, the main link between Camp Sherman and Highway 20, fire division supervisor Melanie Fullman watched her crews walk through brush with their drip torches, dropping gobs of burning oil to do a burnout along the western edge of the roadway - destroying fuel to block the fire's advance toward the community.

In the high humidity, the fire burned slow and low, taking the driest fuel on the ground and passing quickly under healthy trees. In the distance, trees weakened by fire could be heard cracking and falling.

As a land manager for the Salmon-Challis National Forest in Idaho, Fullman does not assess how "bad" a fire might be. Fire, she said, is part of the natural cycle of a forest.

"It always has burned. It always will burn. It's a matter of at what frequency." Turning west to the smoke-shrouded forest, she said, "This is what is burning today."

Typically, no more than 40 percent to 50 percent of trees are killed inside a forest fire, she said. Those that die leave space for new trees and more light for survivors. Fullman, a 15-year forest fire veteran, described the B and B Complex as "fairly typical."

At the evening briefing for fire team leaders, fire commander Bob Anderson noted that the fire has demonstrated a propensity to run and jump over long distances. He said the fight has just begun.

"Basically, we're in round two of a 10-round fight," Anderson said. "We didn't win the last one. We did win this one."

CAPTION(S):

Linda Pyle wipes a tear from her eye after learning from fire officials that her home in Camp Sherman was safe on Friday. Chris Pietsch / The Register-Guard Sherman Cortez of the Northern Pueblo Hot Shots of New Mexico sets a burnout Friday along Highway 20. INSIDE Canada: Flames devour a dozen homes / A7 Western states: Fires continue to grow / A7