April 20, 1997

Eye in the sky helps rangers spot forest fires


ROBERT MOHL
Herald News Editor

	SCOTLAND NECK -- Perched on a narrow ladder, 120 feet above the earth,
Halifax County Forest Ranger James Winfree turns into a stand-up comic.
	"I forgot my keys," he deadpans. "We have to go back down."
	Down, twelve stories down, is the state Forest Service's Halifax
headquarters, where Winfree and his team of six rangers keep tabs on the county's
280,000 acres of forest.
	High above the agency's headquarters on N.C. 125 is the fire observation
tower, the "eye in the sky" which overlooks much of Halifax County.
	"You can see 15 to 20 miles up there," says Winfree, 49.
	Right now the Scotland Neck tower is shut down. About once a month it's used
to triangulate on fires spotted by other towers. Otherwise it's used only for
forestry lessons given to Boy Scouts and school groups.
	"After a scoutmaster comes here they seldom come back," Winfree says. "They
have to climb back up and down with the scouts. The next day they call and say,
'I can't move.'"
	Thirteen towers currently are operating in the state, including one in Medoc
Mountain State Park. There's a bill afoot in the state legislature to reactivate
26 of the towers, including the one here. But it would reverse a long line of
cuts.
	The towers are manned February to May from 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Just one
man, a radio and the horizon.
	The tower, 120 feet of steel and wood, is a chore to climb. The narrow wooden
stairs are close together, like the ladders on a ship. At the top, Winfree
delivers his key line.
	His visitors groan, and then Winfree "finds" his key and opens the tiny room
at the top. There's a chair, two phones, a space heater and a small table.
Everything is painted green. The windows are pierced with BB pellets.
	"Young'uns," Winfree explains.
	The view goes on for miles and miles, but the only thing to see are trees,
farms, and a distant water tower in Enfield. The horizon is clear.
	"Everything up here looks like a little puzzle," Winfree says as he
demonstrates the direction-finding azimuth and explains the difference between
wood smoke (white) and building smoke (black).
	A puff of smoke, barely visible as a purple spot against the blue sky,
sprouts in the northwest. It lasts for a few minutes and then vanishes. A rubbish
fire, Winfree says.
	"That went right down, like it's supposed to," Winfree says. "If it kept
going, we would have sent a smoke chaser."
	A smoke chaser is exactly what it sounds like, a guy in a truck following a
trail of smoke. Sometimes it's difficult to find the source.
	"By not having a couple of towers like we used to, you can't cross it out,"
Winfree says, referring to the method of pinpointing a fire. "If you cross it
out, you can put it right on the money, to within a tenth of a mile."
	Bumblebees buzz in and out of the open windows. Another smoke plume, much
larger, is seen near Scotland Neck. This one refuses to go down, and Winfree
orders assistant rangers Scott Ludlum and Robert Smith to check it out.
	"Usually the fire department is already there," Winfree says. "The county has
a lot more people than it did 30 to 40 years ago."
	A lot more people and a lot of fires. Twenty forest fires have been reported
in the past month, and 166 acres have been burned. Winfree credits the county's
volunteer fire departments with keeping those numbers down, but the rangers still
provide a vital service.
	"We are the so-called gurus of wood fires," Winfree says. Besides their own
expertise, the forest rangers can call on trucks, tractors, a scout plane out of
Rocky Mount and a squadron of firefighting planes out of Kinston.
	"Fire control is only a small part of our total job," Winfree adds. The
Forestry Service spends most of it's time surveying land, drawing up
reforestation plans and checking up on landowners.
	"It's not as exciting as flames and trucks, but it's the livelihood of this
county," Winfree says.