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2006

April 23 2006       Greg Hartell, longtime Crater Lake park family member, dies of Asbestosis of the lungs, contracted through years of historic restoration work. Greg grew up at Crater where his father, Guy, worked in the Maintenance Division.
(Summer 1937 – Guy Hartell of Klamath Falls begins working on road crew and as a snowplow operator. Leaves in 1942 when the Park closes because of the War and is rehired in 1956 after spending 14 years working for the State Highway Department. Guy finally retires in 1970.)

Greg worked over 40 years for various private contractors as a carpenter and construction supervisor. This work included may Crater Lake building projects. In the late 80s, Greg supervised the rehabilitation of the Park’s headquarters buildings.: Sager, Canfield, and Steel Center. During the 1990s Greg worked on the restoration of Crater Lake Lodge and the building of the concessionaire lodging, Mazama Dorm. 2000 saw Greg begin work on historic restoration and rehabilitation of a number of Rim Village structures: Sinnott Overlook, the Community Building, Kiser Studio (VC), and two Stone Comfort Stations. The highlight and the end of his restoration work at Crater Lake would be the Superintendent’s and Naturalist’s houses for the new Science and Learning Center and dorm.

Greg finished the 2004 season, but had to turn over the 2005 season to another company superintendent to finish. Greg would then spend a year fighting mesothelioma cancer.

Greg’s attention to historic detail and design was legendary. In honor of Greg’s extraordinary skills, the Friends of Crater Lake National Park was asked to sponsor with Crater Lake National Park, the Greg Hartell Historic Preservation Internship. This internship is being set up in conjunction with the University of Oregon’s Historic Preservation Program.

May 25 2006 Annie Creek Restaurant set to open at Crater Lake
By Jamie Miller Mail Tribune
A new full-service restaurant will open in Crater Lake National Park in time to feed hungry tourists visiting the unique attraction this summer. Annie Creek Restaurant, in Mazama Village, is part of a concession improvement program at Crater Lake National Park.
Craig Peterson, project supervisor and facility engineer, said the restaurant will refocus some services away from the lake’s rim. The goal is to alleviate heavy traffic on Rim Drive as well as provide park visitors with another full-service restaurant.

The $3.7 million restaurant features a gift shop and 10,443 square feet of space. With the capacity to seat 98 inside and 36 outside, the restaurant is expected to serve 300 to 700 people per day during the park’s busy summer months.

The National Park Service contracted Xanterra Parks and Resorts to manage the Annie Creek Restaurant project. The planning stage began in 2002. Xanterra, a company that manages concessions at Crater Lake and other national parks, will oversee the restaurant’s daily operations.

Peterson, a Xanterra employee, said the restaurant’s design is intended to earn the LEED Certification Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design from the U.S. Green Building Council.

June 2 2006 New Mazama Store and Restaurant opens at Annie Creek.

July 3 2007 Ribbon is cut opening the new $10 million remodeled/rebuilt Rim Village Cafeteria Building, now known as the Rim Café, Gift Shop, and Crater Lake viewing Room.
The price tag included the moving of the parking lot to the rear of the building – the site of the former Cold Water Cabins and Ponderosa Duplexes. A pedestrian “Promenade” will soon be completed.

Meanwhile, the construction fund is out of money – the 1928 Camper’s Store, once more a stand-alone building, sits empty. The Park’s future Visitor Center awaits funding. Costs climb while it sits deteriorating.

After 100 years, the Nation’s 5th oldest National Park still lacks a visitor’s center.

Just to bring the history up to the present – a few years ago the park asked the Trust to help with fundraising for the new Visitor Education Center in the former Camper’s Store building. We had an outside fundraising consultant complete a feasibility study for us about two years ago, which concluded that we could raise about $2 to $3 million from private donors – roughly half the projected cost – if we could first secure the other half from federal funds and build the Trust’s organizational capacity with a larger donor base, staff, etc.

We’ve been doing that work the past two years, and making pretty good progress. In fact, a lobbying effort by the Trust over the past three years, with support from Congressmen Walden and Blumenauer, led to an earmark of $350,000 being included in the most recent Interior Appropriations bill to complete preliminary design for the new Visitor Education Center during 2010. We are hopeful that the park will then secure engineering funds in 2011 and begin construction in 2012. Construction itself could take a few years due to the short season at the rim.

The Trust and park also recently reaffirmed that we want to work together on private fundraising for the Visitor Education Center, with a focus on raising funds for state of the art, multimedia, interactive exhibits. As the project’s design is completed, we will refine plans, but we could begin that fundraising effort before the end of 2010 or in early 2011. Stay tuned…

This all moves a lot slower than we would like, unfortunately…but with any luck, after 107 years without one, we hope the park will finally have its first year round visitor education center on the rim within the next 5-10 years. Dec. 2009
Jeff Allen
Executive Director
Crater Lake National Park Trust

July – September 2006 Beginning July 23rd and spreading through the autumn of 2006, the largest prescribed natural fire to burn in Crater Lake N.P. history was underway. Called The Bybee Creek Fire Complex, it was permitted to burn about 3000 acres under monitoring until cold, wet weather suppressed it. The fire was contained below Rim Drive, but under more (critical? Explain) fire weather may have threatened not only the historic lookout, with its wood shingled roof, but also may have spotted? (explain) to Wizard Island. This fire event has expanded open pumice fields and dry meadows and provided a diversity of habitats for studies of future conifer recruitment especially for seed caches of whitebark pine.

July 23 2006 Lightning storms ignite several fires in the Park. The Bybee One and Two August 7) fires are allowed to burn “naturally for a month. By August 25 the fire has grown to 1300 acres. 69 firefighters are dispatched to ring the fire and keep it contained to keep it from spreading north and south, but the fire is allowed to burn east toward Rim Drive. The fire behavior is what has been prescribed for a natural wild land fire.

Natural Fire Burning Within Crater Lake National Park

On Sunday July 23rd, Crater Lake National Park received over 50 lightning strikes along with significant precipitation. Three fires are currently burning in remote areas of the park as a result of this storm and a July 3 lightning storm.

The National Park Service is managing these fires as wildland fire use fires for ecosystem benefits. Such fires are allowed to burn and spread naturally when they do not threaten people or property. Wildland fire use is an important tool for restoring fire dependent ecosystems. As these fires burn naturally, a mosaic is created across the landscape, breaking up continuous fuels into self- checking firebreaks. Fires managed under Wildland Fire Use are beneficial to the forest ecosystem, removing dead wood accumulations and recycling nutrients back into the soil.

Fire managers expect these fires to burn throughout the summer. Varying degrees of growth and movement of the fires is expected. The fires will be managed to prevent any threats to public safety or facilities, and to keep them from leaving the park.

Visitors to the park should expect smoky conditions as localized smoke settles over the lake during late afternoon and evening hours. Visitors will find a better chance of smoke-free views and photo opportunities earlier in the day. There are good opportunities to view these fires from West Rim Drive in the park.

Summer 2006 Test well being drilled incase an additional source of water needs to be developed to supplement the Park’s Annie Spring water source.

July 30 2006 From: “James S. Rouse” <jsrouse@fidalgo.net>

Congratulations Larry (Smith) on your AASLH award. A most deserving honor. You have established a remarkable track record and made an outstanding difference in the Crater Lake interpretative programs. I only regret that I didn’t capitalize on your remarkable knowledge of the Crater Lake history while I was there. Although I was aware that you and Lee Julerut (I believe) were working on and completed the “Behind the Scenes” story while I was there. (I think I still have my copy)

I sat in on many of your campfire programs, and like most of the visitors, learned a lot about that special place.

Wish we could spend more time together. My best wishes again.
Jim Rouse former CRLA superintendent

August 13 2006 Crater Lake hosts marathon H/N By Josh Petrie
Alex Peterson, 15, who will be a sophomore at Klamath Union High School in the fall competes in the Crater Lake Marathon at Crater Lake National Park.

With temperatures hovering around 40 degrees at the start and an average elevation of about 7,000 feet throughout the course, the runners at Saturday’s Crater Lake Rim Runs marathon knew they were in for a tough race.

The two first-time Rim Run competitors who led the pack of 116 didn’t know how tough until the 22-mile marker.

Todd Ragsdale, a 37-year-old produce stacker from Talent, charged through the course first in 3 hours, 5 minutes, 45 seconds, followed by Ruslan Tkebuchava, 25, in 3:11:59.

“To come out on top is just icing on the cake,” Ragsdale said. “I’ve never won a marathon, so to have this be my first win is one I’ll definitely always look back on as an old man.”

Before finishing, both men had to first scale the hill at Grayback, an area where racers face a 470-foot elevation gain in 2.2 miles. Ragsdale and Tkebuchava had heard about Grayback, but neither had experienced it firsthand.

“I’d rather do any of the other eight miles than those two miles up the hill,” Ragsdale said. “It’s such an abrupt change of pace. You’re coming downhill for so long, you’re beating up your quads on the downhill, then all of a sudden, it’s just a whole other world.
“Actually for me, it’s more how long the hill is than how steep it is,” he said. “I can charge up a steep hill and be done with it, but a long one you keep going and going and going, and it’s a little bit discouraging.”
Donna Anderson came to Crater Lake from Danville, Ky., to run one last marathon before she turns 40.

She made the trip worthwhile, finishing fifth overall in 3:25:28 and winning women’s overall honors.

Anderson not only enjoyed the victory, but also the scenery provided by the lake and surrounding forest.

“It’ll be fun to call home and tell my kids and husband,” she said. “The scenery is just amazing, and the crisp air, there was no humidity and the weather was awesome.”

For Harold Brown of LaGrande, this marathon marked a milestone in his road-racing career.

Brown, 50, completed his 100th marathon – and 16th Rim Run – when he crossed the line in 4:16:52.

‘I want to run 100,’ “ Brown said. “It’s taken 25 years, and I’ve done it. It feels good, and I want to do another 100.”

August 14 2006 Army veteran finally gets to run H/N Klamath Falls, Oregon, by Josh Petrie

During a military career that spanned 20 years, Eddie Hahn registered twice for the Crater Lake Rim Runs marathon. Both times, he was called to duty right before the race.
But now that his service in the U.S. Army is complete, Hahn, 40, finally had his chance to run Saturday morning.
He completed the marathon in 5 hours, 17 minutes and 57 seconds, but the time was irrelevant.
What was important was finally being able to compete at a race he had wanted to run for years.
“It was beautiful. Probably one of the most scenic courses I’ve ran,” Hahn said. “Aesthetic would probably be the word for it. You earn your views.”

August 18 2006 RICHARD L. HILL The Oregonian
Hidden below the cobalt-blue surface of Crater Lake is a remarkable sight that few have seen: lush fields of green moss. Scientists say the moss likely is a vital player in the lake’s ecosystem, but little is known about it. Now a research team is plunging into a study of the community of the deep-water moss, Drepanocladus aduncus Warnst.

Scientists will launch a trunk-sized robot submarine into the nation’s deepest lake Monday to examine the colonies of aquatic moss that thrive 65 to 400 feet deep around the rim of the steep-walled caldera and at Wizard Island. “This is the first stage of trying to understand its ecological importance,” said Mark Buktenica, a biologist with Crater Lake National Park. “It’s obviously significant, because the biomass of the moss probably dwarfs all the other life in the lake put together.”

The project has attracted scientists from the Park Service, the U.S. Geological Survey, Oregon State University and Southern Oregon University. They say the moss could serve as a long-term indicator of the lake’s health. Bob Collier, an OSU oceanographer, said the moss poses no problems to the lake’s famed clarity and might “date back to the earliest days of the lake.” Mount Mazama violently erupted and collapsed 7,700 years ago, forming the 1,943-foot-deep lake.

“The moss is very important, with algae, diatoms, worms and other organisms living in it, so it may be an ecosystem in itself,” Collier said. “But we’re just starting to learn about what’s there.” Earlier this month, researchers aboard the park’s research boat Neuston pulled a camera toting sled through several moss-covered areas, primarily around Wizard Island, and hauled in samples. It was the first step in the study.

The more maneuverable submersible being used next week — called a Phantom — is equipped with a camera and an arm to grab samples. The 200-pound, remote-controlled vehicle is from Glen Canyon National Recreation Area in Utah and Arizona, where it’s been used to retrieve drowning victims.

A submersible will be used in the lake for the first time since a one-person sub explored the lake floor in 1988 and 1989. Buktenica and Collier, along with the OSU oceanographer Jack Dymond, first spotted the moss during those dives. Dymond, who died in 2003, described it after making the first dive to the lake floor near Wizard Island. “The bottom around 200 feet is completely covered with moss that is on the order of a foot or so in height,” he said in a 1988 interview. “It’s a spectacular scene. It looks like a grassy field.”

History of moss research in Crater Lake by Doug Larson: “Biota associated with deep benthic moss creates scientific excitement at Crater Lake,” Park Science, Vol.9, No.3, Spring 1989. The author was Dr. Harry K.Phinney, professor emeritus in the Department of Botany and Plant Physiology at Oregon State University. Harry, who served on my doctoral committee at OSU, passed away around 1992.

Phinney reports the following: In 1953, C.W. Fairbanks, Assistant Park Naturalist, and John Rowley, Ranger Naturalist, collected moss from several locations on the lake from depths extending to 129 meters. This work was reported in a Crater Lake Nature Note, Vol.20, 1954. Samples were sent to Dr. Henry S. Conard of Grinnell College, who identified the sample as Scleropodium obtusifolium (Mitt.) Kindb. A sample was also sent to Dr. Francis Drouet, Curator of Crytogramic Plants at the Chicago Museum of Natural History. He identified the moss as Drepanocladus fluitans (Hedw.) Warnst.

Fairbanks, Rowley, Rowley’s wife Joanne and Richard Brown continued to survey mosses during the early 1950s. They collected over 100 bottom samples from depths ranging between “10 feet to over 1900 feet.” They found moss “in all quadrants of the lake, indicating that the occurrence of the moss in Crater Lake is non-random.”

In November 1965, Richard Brown sent two moss samples to Dr. Elva Lawton of the University of Washington. She identified the moss as Drepanocladus aduncus (Hedw.) Warnst. Brown also sent samples to Herman Persson of the Riksmuseet Paleobotaniska in Stockholm, Sweden. He also identified the moss as Drepanocladus aduncus (Hedw.) Warnst.

In 1988, Dr. Gary Larson sent a moss sample collected from 221 meters (by Dr. Sylvia Earle while piloting the submersible “Deep Rover”) to Dr. W.B. Schofield at the University of British Columbia. He identified the moss as Drepanocladus uncinatus (Hedw.) Warnst.

The article in yesterday’s Oregonian referred to the moss as Drepanocladus aduncus Warnst.

In his article, Phinney provided a detailed description of the epiphytic flora attached to the moss, including diatoms and green filamentous algae. Phinney also observed a diverse, but sparse fauna associated with the moss, including one tardigrade (waterbear), two unidentified nematodes (roundworms), two rotifer species, and several unidentified mobile ciliates.

August 20 2006 Found in the ashes of Mt. Mazama By MARTIN J. KIDSTON – IR
HELMVILLE — Rubber galoshes rising to his knees, archaeologist Steve Platt shaves through a layer of concrete-colored ash at the bottom of a trench. The trench has filled with water from last night’s rain, but the ash has been here for 6,850 years, deposited by a cataclysmic eruption 900 miles away.

The eruption of Mount Mazama in the Oregon Cascades was the largest volcanic event to hit North America in at least 10,000 years. The ash rained down for days, burying a prehistoric camp that archaeologists are now working to uncover in western Montana. The tools and trappings of that ancient band of people were capped by the workings of geology and hidden until now.

A group of University of Montana students first discovered the camp in the 1960s.
Nearly everything they needed to survive the summer months was right here.
On a day not unlike this one 6,850 years ago, Mazama blasted 3,000 feet of mountaintop, opening a caldera five miles wide and one mile deep (today’s Crater Lake in Oregon). The sky turned dark and ash swirled down in a terrible blizzard of grit over the Pacific Northwest.

The ominous cloud drifted as far east as Billings and as far south as Reno, Nev. For a band of ancient people, the event was likely frightening. How it altered their lives, nobody really knows. But given the impacts the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens had on our modern civilization, Mazama — whose eruption was more than 40 times larger — would have disrupted life for hundreds of years.
“The ash is like ground-up glass,” Platt said. “It would have worn out the teeth of the animals that grazed here pretty fast. It’s perfectly possible that people may have left this site for a few hundred years. It would have been tough going and dusty.”

The ash in this particular pit is nearly a foot deep
The Mazama eruption may have done more than darken the sky and create a storm of lung-choking ash across the Pacific Northwest. Bill Eckerle, a geoarchaeologist based in Salt Lake City who has a long history of digging in Montana, believes the Mazama eruption changed the climate.
The bow and arrow hadn’t been invented yet, and wouldn’t be for more than 7,000 years. Paleo Indians hunted with atlatals and spears. Antelope, bison, beaver and bighorn sheep likely were abundant.

Archaeologists have already found ancient bone fragments from bison and beaver at the site. Platt pulls a chunk of ungulate bone from the wall of one trench. Bones like this were often crushed and boiled. The fat — melted from the marrow — was mixed with berries and used to cure meat in a product Platt referred to as pemmican.

“If you’re job was to go out and kill game for your family, you’d get pretty good at making tools,” Platt said. “It’s not a super-lengthy process. It only takes a skilled worker 15 to 20 minutes to complete each tool.”

August 21 2006 Roving the floor of Crater Lake Scientists set out this month to answer questions about the large growth at the bottom of Oregon’s Crater Lake. A remotely operated vehicle system will be used to gather video footage and test samples to determine how this natural community fits into the lake’s ecosystem. The research is being carried out by representatives of Oregon State University, the National Park Service, U.S. Geological Survey and Southern Oregon University. The scientists will be using remotely operated vehicles to explore the moss beds at the bottom of the lake.

August 22 2006 Bull trout comeback It was the trout. Or maybe a giant salamander. This wasn’t some stream of consciousness metaphysical thing. I was genuinely slithering upstream, partially submerged in the riffles of chilly Sun Creek searching for bull trout.
Crater Lake National Park fisheries biologists Collin Christianson and Stephanie Orlaineta had outfitted three of us in two layers of undergarments, a fleece jumpsuit that fit over our clothes, then a zip-up dry suit with a heavy nylon shell. Neoprene covered our heads and hands, and oversized boots went over neoprene booties. We breathed through snorkels and watched for bull trout with scuba masks. I felt like a genetic deviant, part ninja, part Gene Simmons from the rock group “Kiss.”

The gear is standard equipment biologists use to count populations of the rare, elusive bull trout. Because the unschooled trout don’t congregate in groups, when biologists want to determine fish numbers it’s necessary to visit their underwater environment.

Bull trout is a native fish species biologists say evolved and inhabited cold-water streams like Sun Creek for more than 10,000 years, longer than Crater Lake has existed. Today, Klamath Basin bull trout are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act

Sun Creek is the only remaining stream in the park with bull trout. Small populations were once found in nearby Sevenmile, Cherry, Fourmile and Threemile creeks and, further away, in tributaries of the Sycan River and streams in the Gearhart Mountain Wilderness Area. In the Upper Klamath Lake region they now only occur in Sun and Three Mile creeks. In recent years they have gone extinct in roughly 40 percent of their historic habitat.

In Sun Creek, bull trout used to travel up to 15 miles from the springs near Crater Lake’s rim to Upper Klamath Lake, where they fattened themselves on insects and tinier fish. Under ideal conditions, migrating bull trout can grow up to 3 feet long, weigh 20 to 30 pounds and live 12 years or more. In Sun Creek, the fish are much smaller, usually only 8 to 10 inches long. Bull trout are a subgroup of the salmon family, but they do not necessarily die after spawning and can spawn more than once.

In recent years human activities and non-native brook trout decimated bull trout.
“Brook trout are more aggressive than bull trout. They breed at a younger age. And they have more eggs per female. They literally swamp out the bull trout,” Buktenica said, noting brook males often mate with female bull trout, which further depletes the reproductive success of bull trout.
In Sun Creek, bull trout that once migrated up to 100 miles are now confined to a short stretch of the river’s pristine upper reaches.
Buktenica says in 1989 Sun Creek’s bull trout populations were perilously threatened – a fish count found only 150.

Program rebuilds numbers
So the park launched a vigorous program to rebuild those numbers. It appears to be working. Last year’s count found 2,400 bull trout in a five-mile section of the creek, a healthy 900 increase from a year earlier. Bull trout differ from brook trout because they lack markings on their dorsal fins. Their backs are olive green with distinct pink or yellow spots, while their bellies are light-colored.
“That’s a conservative estimate. We know there’s more than we can see,” Buktenica said.

Measures have included electro-shocking selected portions of Sun Creek to catch and transplant bull trout, and to capture and kill brook trout. Two artificial waterfalls were built to prevent brook trout from swimming upstream to protected bull trout waters. After bull trout were removed, biologists applied antimycin, a deadly fish toxin to kill remaining brookies. Antimycin is an antibiotic that is harmless to mammals, birds and most other stream inhabitants.
“We believe that without taking any action, bull trout would have gone extinct,” Buktenica said.

I saw my first underwater trout at a likely place, a small slack water area near a log. The others, Paula Fong, a member of the Crater Lake Natural History Association, and Trish Door, new education coordinator for the Crater Lake Science and Learning Center, had spied it earlier. Logs, undercut banks and boulders are favored fish hiding spots.

Minutes later, further upstream, I found two more. One was the stuff of fascination. It dashed and darted, possibly boggled by, from a fish’s point of view, the floundering whale-sized piece of fleece and neoprene that was me, only inches away. While I parked myself in the shallow underwater hole, the small bull trout flickered back and forth. It periodically hid in the shadows, then quick-zipped out into the stream to snatch food. Other times it paddled within inches of my goggles, looking at me eye-to-eye.

“The natural condition of Sun Creek is to have bull trout,” said Buktenica, who added the next phase of the recovery effort includes working closely with the Oregon Department of Forestry where Sun Creek passes through waters they manage and, critical to ongoing success, downstream private landowners.
“We need to get migratory fish back,” he said. “Hopefully, someday we’ll see Sun Creek open to fishing again.” By LEE JUILLERAT – Herald And News

August 25 2006 Learning Center opens doors Herald & News
It’s known worldwide for its beauty. Now Crater Lake National Park is officially a classroom, too.

The park’s new Science and Learning Center was dedicated Friday with speeches by dignitaries and even a ribbon to snip. It will provide a setting for science study by kindergarten through 12th-grade students, college undergrads and graduates, and professional scientists.
The center will be in the park’s original superintendent’s residence, built in 1933. Residential quarters will be nearby in the original chief naturalist’s house, constructed in 1932.

Both buildings have been restored with appropriations from Congress, grants from private foundations and $500,000 in entry fees from Crater Lake visitors. Researchers have long used the park for study. Now, though, there will be office and conference facilities, workspaces, laboratories, and library and museum collections to support their work.

The center will operate in partnership with OIT and Southern Oregon University. Besides use by OIT students, Dow said, the two schools’ faculties will be able to do joint research projects.

“We’ve been fortunate to develop a wonderful relationship with OIT and Southern Oregon,” park superintendent Chuck Lundy said.

He thanked contributors to the center, particularly the Jeld-Wen Foundation for its $500,000 challenge grant for rehabilitation of the buildings.
“We are tremendously grateful that they view the Crater Lake Science and Learning Center as worthy of their large donation,” Lundy said. Bob Kingzett, Jeld-Wen Foundation executive director, said it was gratifying that so many young school children will use the facilities. “We’re delighted to be part of it,” he said. State Sen. Jason Atkinson noted that proceeds from sale of Crater Lake license plates will fund the center’s operation. No public money will be used for that purpose.

A total of $2.4 million has been raised by sales of the plates – almost halfway to the $5 million goal. A trust will be established with the money, Atkinson said, and operational costs will be paid with the interest. Other speakers mentioned the special gifts Crater Lake offers visitors.
“It’s places like Crater Lake that teach us, inspire us, comfort us and put us in touch with a greater power,” U.S. Rep. Greg Walden said.

August 31 2006 ANDY BRONSON / N-R There’s a scenic overlook where onlookers gather throughout each day, next to fire managers who monitor fire’s movement from above. Morgan Miller, a Bybee fire information officer stationed at the overlook, said about 300 to 500 visitors stop each day to observe the fire.

She said most visitors experience initial shock when they learn the fire is left to burn, but nearly 98 percent gain a favorable impression once they learn of the fire’s uses.

On Crater Lake, tour boats putter around on a daily basis, providing visitors an up-close look at its water and the remnants of Mt. Mazama.. But some days smoke from the Bybee fire fills the six-mile wide caldera and shuts down tours, with visibility reduced to less than 50 feet.

Even with the smoke, we don‚t apologize that the vistas aren’t as grand as they could be”, said Crater Lake Park Ranger Thomas McDonough.

On the ground, about 60 to 70 firefighters maintain control lines each day, preventing the fire from spreading toward undesirable directions. Miller said last week a helicopter had to make a few runs to cool hot spots near the Pacific Crest Trail.

In 2004, she said $1.7 million was spent in Crater Lake National Park to suppress a 100-acre fire.

The Bybee fire pales in comparison and has cost about $500,000 thus far. It is named for its proximity to Bybee Creek.

September 3 2006 Roseburg N-R report
Wherever the grating ‘skraaaaaaa’ of the Clark’s Nutcracker can be heard, the bird is spreading whitebark pine seeds — yet the two species’ symbiotic relationship is threatened by a deadly disease.

On timberline ridges of the Cascades, where whitebark pine is the dominant species, a non-native disease known as white pine blister rust is slowly choking trees to death, one-by-one.

The fungus is catastrophic to various five-needle pines — including sugar pine and western white pine in the Pacific Northwest — and can decimate whitebark pine stands once infected.

Crater Lake National Park contains the largest lakeside collection of whitebark pine stands in the world, yet their needles are slowly browning and falling away to blister rust.

Based on the current rate of infection, scientists estimate by 2050 half of the national park’s whitebark pine trees will be dead.
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The disease quickly made its way south after being introduced to Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1910 with a nursery stock of infected trees from France.

September 4 2006 Tom McDonough sets park record – 38 summers at Crater Lake –
by ADAM PEARSON / News Review Roseburg, OR
Break out the pictures of Crater Lake National Park in the family photo album and look in the background — if you see a park ranger, it’s probably Thomas McDonough.

For 38 summers, McDonough has been as much a fixture on Crater Lake’s rim as its whitebark pine and rocky ridgetops.

A longtime interpreter at the park, McDonough has presented the history of Mount Mazama and its eruption nearly 8,000 years ago to thousands of visitors.

“We try to give people some basic explanation on why the scenery looks like it does,” McDonough said of the duties he and his 12-ranger staff carry out on a daily basis. “We’re educators.”

On a recent afternoon last week, McDonough could be heard addressing a new group of Crater Lake visitors.

“The rock walls that we see here are a very small remnant of Mount Mazama,” McDonough said. “No mountain is constantly eruptive. This is not a dead system.”

McDonough has repeated those reminders for nearly four decades, explaining that the caldera’s famous blue water isn’t granted a permanent basin in the centerline of the Cascades.

Staff members say McDonough’s schooling on the crater’s geology and formation is critical to their ability to dole out information to visitors.

“It’s great to have somebody with that kind of in-depth knowledge,” said Crater Lake Park Ranger Dave Grimes.

Grimes has learned a lot from his senior staff member during his four years of service at the park. However, his tutelage under McDonough goes back to when he was just 8 years old.

“I visited Crater Lake as a tourist,” he said, circa 1978, and recently “found a picture of Ranger Tom giving a presentation on horseback. So apparently I saw one of his presentations as a kid.”

Grimes said the ’70s were a whole different era, but McDonough is still “the same guy.”

When McDonough isn’t enlightening Crater Lake’s visitors, he’s teaching students at Chemeketa Community College in Salem. He has shared his wealth of knowledge on a number of subjects ranging from physics and astronomy to oceanography and geology.

McDonough, 58, has taught at Chemeketa for 30 years. But he doesn’t think too much about school whenever he’s in Crater Lake National Park. He focuses on what keeps him coming back to the same place every summer.
“The alpine environment,” he said, and “I love to stargaze.”

A San Francisco native, McDonough said he had no idea there were so many stars in the night sky until his first visit to Crater Lake.

Nowadays McDonough is an impromptu instructor on the solar system for any fellow park ranger curious enough to peer through his telescope.

Asked about the recent demotion of Pluto from its planetary status, McDonough said the international astronomy group’s decision didn’t surprise him at all.

“I have felt for a long time it was going to be flushed as a planet” and put into a sub-group, he said, chuckling with a bit of insider knowledge.

It’ll be a long time before McDonough gives up his summer day job and star-gazing post.

“I’m still able to enjoy the park and the public,” he said.

September 6 2006 Natural end sought for Crater Lake fire By PAUL FATTIG Mail Tribune
Mother Nature remains squarely in charge of putting out the 2,100-acre Bybee Fire complex burning in a remote area of the Crater Lake National Park.
Since the fire was sparked by lightning on July 23 — followed by a second lightning ignition on Aug. 7 — the National Park Service has largely allowed the blaze to burn naturally. The fire isn’t expected to be snuffed out until the arrival of the first fall rain or snowstorm.

September 29 2006 No charges filed in bicyclist’s death The News-Review <http://www.oregonnews.com/>
Authorities with the Crater Lake National Park completed their investigation Wednesday into the August death of Roseburg resident Michael Simmons.

Dave Brennan, the park’s chief ranger, said today no criminal charges will be filed against the motorcyclist who collided with Simmons and his bicycle Aug. 19 on East Rim Drive at the park.

Simmons, a 61-year-old avid outdoorsman, was riding in the Umpqua Velo Club’s annual Rim-to-Roseburg Ride at the time of the accident.

Brennan said the crash occurred as Simmons turned left from Skell Head Overlook into the northbound lane of East Rim Drive.

Investigators believe Simmons angled into the southbound lane and into the path of the southbound motorcyclist as he made the turn, Brennan said.

“We believe that both the motorcyclist and the bicyclist did everything they could to avoid the collision,” Brennan said.

Simmons was critically injured in the crash and died Sept. 6 at Rogue Valley Medical Center in Medford.

The motorcyclist, Mark Rose, 46, of Fridley, Minn., was not injured.
Brennan said the decision not to file criminal charges against Rose was made with assistance from an assistant U.S. attorney in Medford.

October 2006 Oregon Public Broadcasting, as part of its “Oregon Experience” program
series, produces:

William Gladstone Steel
29 min on 1 DVD
For home and educational use
List $19.95
Producer: Kami Horton

William Gladstone Steel is considered the Father of Crater Lake National Park and was instrumental in preserving the Cascade Range Reserve. His efforts lead to millions of acres of protected forestlands and watersheds, but he was also an opportunistic entrepreneur who pushed for roads and development. Complex and controversial, he dedicated his life to the mountains of Oregon.

Park Historian Stephen Mark and long time park volunteer and former seasonal ranger Larry Smith are both featured speakers on the program.

October 14 2006 Saturday. 8-year-old boy disappears along the North Rim when Samuel “Sammy” Boehlke slips away from his father near Cleetwood Cove.

October 16 2006 Family of Lost Boy Expresses Their Thanks
The family of Samuel Becker Boehlke, the 8-year-old boy lost at Crater Lake has asked not to be contacted by the media at this time. Below is a statement from the family:

“The family of Samuel Becker Boehlke wants to sent our appreciation for the card and generosity we have received from the searchers, the Crater Lake National Park employees, associated partners and the support staff. Without their kind reassurance this situation would be unbearable. Sam’s mother wishes to relay the following statement: Bring blessings upon the searchers and support people. My love to their families. I am truly grateful to the community and their support in their efforts to find Sam.” We know that some of the best search and rescue people in the Northwest and beyond are here around the clock. Those searching, both volunteers and professionals, are enduring rough conditions in the cold and wet snow. WE are so thankful for their perseverance and expertise.

We continue to hope for a good outcome and we keep the faith that Sammy will be found. We thank for the community of Crater Lake and the public for their compassion and prayers.

Sam’s family, the Boehlkes and Beckers

October 17 2006 Tuesday Search continues for lost boy at Crater Lake
More than 100 searchers from teams across the region braved wintry conditions today to continue looking for an 8-year-old boy who got separated from his father Saturday at Crater Lake National Park.

Snow that started falling Sunday afternoon has piled up between six inches and a foot and a half around the park, said Michael Justin, a spokesman at the park. Falling snow and winds of up to 35 mph grounded search helicopters and made searches from horseback unsafe, he said.

Although the park’s north entrance and Rim Drive were closed to the public because of severe weather, people searching on foot and with dogs combed an area roughly a square mile in size where Samuel “Sammie” Boehlke slipped away from his father, Ken Boehlke. The Boehlkes had stopped at a pullout about 500 yards east of the Cleetwood Cove parking lot and were walking on the north side of Rim Drive when Sammie disappeared at about 4 p.m. Saturday, Justin said.

Sammie is 4 feet, 11 inches tall, weighs about 85 pounds and has brown eyes and short brown hair. He was last seen wearing a long-sleeved black and green T-shirt, cargo pants, a blue winter coat and red, suede slip-on shoes with rubber soles. Searchers said Sammie is autistic and fearful.

Search teams working today include those from Jackson, Klamath and Deschutes counties, National Park search experts from California, Washington and Oregon, including specialty rescue teams from Mount Hood and Mount Rainier, and local U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management employees.

Searchers said Sammie is autistic and fearful. Overnight lows were predicted to dip to around 24 degrees, but the weather forecast calls for a decreasing chance of precipitation today and less wind. “We hope to see clearing for the helicopters to work,” Justin said.
.
October 19 2006 Missing – The hunt for the Portland 8-year-old who vanished at Crater Lake gets
longer, wider and grimmer Thursday, MATTHEW PREUSCH The Oregonian
After nine hours of trudging through thick, wet woods in Crater Lake National Park looking for a Portland boy missing since Saturday, all Manny Ortiz’s 16-person Forest Service crew found was a deflated yellow balloon.

“That’s pretty much the only clue we’ve seen,” Ortiz said Wednesday.

Even though the rescuers believed the balloon was probably old trash unrelated to Samuel Boehlke’s disappearance, they marked its coordinates with a global-positioning unit.

There was a brief moment of hope the day before when a helicopter pilot spotted what he thought were footprints in the snow, but those turned out to be bear tracks.

As the fourth day of the massive operation drew to a close, the story from crews emerging from the now 50-square-mile search area was chillingly similar: still no sign of the elementary school student.

“It’s tough work,” said Ortiz, his black boots caked with mud. “Most of us have kids, and that’s what makes us try a little harder.” .

The boy’s family says he has an affinity for small places such as closets, so searchers have focused on rock overhangs, downed trees and similar natural features.

“There are a lot of places an 8-year-old could fit into,” said Rudy Evenson, search spokesman.

Such a sheltering space would provide some measure of protection against snow, rain and sub-freezing temperatures on the mountain.
Crews on Wednesday moved farther into the forested backcountry north of the lake after scans of the area around where the boy first went missing turned up nothing. The search now encompasses most of the northeast quarter of the park.

While warmer temperatures made roads easier to travel and somewhat improved conditions in the woods, searchers were soaked through for a second day by melting snow.

The number of searchers has dropped by about 50, down from a high near 200 Tuesday, Evenson said. An Oregon National Guard helicopter that had been scanning the area with heat detection equipment also left for a new mission.

Searchers so far haven’t concentrated on looking in the lake for the boy because they believe it’s unlikely he hiked down a mile-long trail to the water. And if he’d fallen down the steep cliffs along the rim, he would have landed short of the lake’s edge, Evenson said.

The boy’s parents are both on the scene, his mother having returned from Italy after hearing the news. They visited the search base camp set up near Cleetwood Cove but haven’t made any public statements since thanking searchers for their efforts earlier in the week.

October 21 2006 Saturday The tone at Crater Lake National Park on Friday changed from a desperate search to find a missing 8-year-old Portland boy to a dismal reality that park officials likely won’t find him alive.

(Thursday) was pretty much the last major push, said search spokesman Rudy Evenson. By Friday, the number of searchers decreased from nearly 200 to 35, who were mostly park officials and local search and rescue teams.

They spent the morning taking down search-grid markers in 3,000 acres of terrain surrounding Sammy’s last known location. They had earlier scoured every crevice, but found nothing.

The long-term plan is to periodically search the area 500 yards from the Cleetwood Cove parking lot until winter, he added.

Officials have expressed frustration over the fruitless search, and say Sammy’s fear of loud noises made the search more difficult. The boy has a high-functioning form of autism spectrum disorder, which causes him to have extreme reactions to loud noises.
Searchers were unable to use sirens or whistles to find Sammy, and say the disorder also causes him to hide, creating a roadblock they wouldn’t experience with another lost person, Evenson said.

Though they’ve declined to speak with the media, the family, in a statement, expressed appreciation to searchers for their incredible conduct, kindness and superb efforts on behalf of our families. We appreciate the sacrifice their families are making for them to be here.

A pink ribbon around a dead tree on a rocky ridge overlooking Crater Lake marks the last spot 8-year-old Sammy Boehlke’s father saw him before the boy disappeared into the woods. After five days of searching through rain, snow and subfreezing temperatures by some 145 trained personnel in the national park, that ribbon and a nearby spot where a tracking dog picked up his scent are the only signs of the boy since he ran away Saturday afternoon from his father’s car while parked along the road.

“The only thing we’ve seen out there is animal tracks so far,” said Chrissy Campanelli of Maple Falls, Wash., a member of the Rogue River Hotshots firefighting crew.

Pete Reinhardt, who oversees law enforcement at the park and is a division supervisor on the search, said they have not given up hope.

“The thing that’s going to help this kid is if he had enough intuition, survival skills or just drive that he got into a rocky area where he could protect himself from the weather,” said Reinhardt. “We haven’t given up hope, because there are documented cases of people living a long time.”

Sammy and his father, Kenneth Boehlke of Portland, were spending last weekend with family members at nearby Diamond Lake Resort, when the two of them decided to go up to Crater Lake for a hike.

They were driving along Rim Drive near the Cleetwood Cove trailhead when they pulled over at a turnout overlooking the lake, and got out of the car.

“The dad says it’s time to go,” said Evenson. “The boy decides he doesn’t want to go, and decides to play hide and seek.”

The boy, described by his family as exhibiting symptoms of autism, ran across the road and climbed a steep and rocky slope, disappearing over the top. His father looked for him, and after a couple hours flagged down a passing car, which relayed a call to 911.

The rugged area has “a lot of dead and downed trees. A lot of rock piles, a lot of places that an 8-year-old could fit into,” Evenson said. “Sammy’s family has let us know that one of the things he likes to do is to curl up in small spaces.”

Park personnel mounted a search, but had just a short time before dark, and quickly realized that it was going to take a larger effort, said Mac Brock, park natural resources officer. They called in a National Park Service incident management team and search teams from Rainier to Yosemite national parks, nearby national forests, and local counties.

The search was concentrated first on the immediate area around the spot the boy was last seen, and has gradually moved out to cover a three-mile radius, Reinhardt said. About 145 people took part Wednesday.

“To have an 8-year-old boy out there with just slip-on shoes would be life and death on a summer night at this altitude,” said Lindsay Clunes of the Corvallis Mountain Rescue Unit. “But late fall and turning to snow? Hopefully, he’s hidden. But that just makes it tougher.”

The 20 members of the Rogue River Hotshots spread out in a line, about 30 feet apart, and walked their assigned grid, looking under rocks, downed logs and trees in snow about 6 inches deep. A special rock-climbing rescue crew from Yosemite National Park has rappelled down the steep caldera wall. Boats have plied the shore of the lake. Horseback teams looked along an old road. A helicopter searched open areas. Each team logged in their search areas on Global Positioning System instruments, which were marked on a map at search headquarters.

On Tuesday, a tracking dog showed signs of recognizing the boy’s scent, but other dogs failed to confirm it. The helicopter crew spotted tracks Wednesday going up a snow-covered knoll, but when they landed for a closer look realized they were left by wildlife. A search crew from the Fremont-Winema National Forest found a deflated yellow balloon on a downed log.

But nothing led them any closer to the boy.

Chances the boy could have been abducted are considered slim, Reinhardt said. Traffic in the park is light in fall. The father only saw two cars go by in the time he searched. The two entrances to the park were staffed, and no one saw the boy in the cars leaving. © 2006 CBS Interactive Inc.

October 23 2006 Ceremony marks end of formal search for boy. The family of a missing Portland boy gathered at Crater Lake this weekend to recognize that the formal search for their son is over. The group gathered on Rim Drive, near the spot where Sammy was last seen by his father and included about a dozen family members and six Klamath Tribes ceremonial drummers. “We do not have any resolution,” Becker said. “Ambiguity is difficult, but the land here is very beautiful, but nature takes away. It looks like this time it took Sam.”

A tribal elder recited a tribal blessing and drummers performed several songs. “Sammy is in a better place.”

Since You Asked: Boy lost at Crater Lake remains a mystery

March 04, 2010
Seeing a story in the Mail Tribune paper on March 1 about a 13-year-old boy lost in the snow in Washington made me think of the boy who was visiting Crater Lake a few years back and bolted into the woods.

I remember searchers looked for him for quite a while with no success. Was he ever found?

— A.B., via e-mail

Sadly, the mystery of Samuel Boehlke’s disappearance remains unsolved more than three years after he vanished near the rim of the caldera at Crater Lake National Park.

Horsemen, mountain rescue squads and searchers with dogs combed the north rim of Crater Lake for days in October 2006 after the 8-year-old Portland-area boy became separated from his father. Rescue specialists from as far as northern Washington and Southern California gathered at Oregon’s only national park to look for the boy known as “Sammie.”

Helicopters combed a 4,000-acre search area, and rappellers from Yosemite National Park scrambled down the steep caldera looking for the boy, but no trace of him was ever found.

During the search, park officials said Sammie had some behaviors that were associated with low-level autism, but he had not been diagnosed with an autism disorder. The family declined to talk to reporters during the search, which ended when early season snow covered the park.

Michael Justin, public information officer for the park, said Wednesday that a large search-and-rescue training exercise at the park last fall focused on locating some trace of the boy, but nothing was found.

Justin said Sammie’s disappearance “still keeps me awake at night sometimes. We feel so sorry for the family.”

The fruitless search in the snow reminded some volunteers of a similar effort eight years earlier just a few miles away.

In December 1998, dozens of volunteers tramped through deep snow in search of Derrick Engebretson, an 8-year-old Klamath County boy who vanished while cutting a Christmas tree with his father. That search ended after a week, when searchers could find no sign of the boy. His disappearance remains a mystery, too.

Send questions to “Since You Asked,” Mail Tribune Newsroom, P.O. Box 1108, Medford, OR 97501

December 2006 Dave Brennan, Chief Ranger at Crater Lake for 7.5 years and with 27 years in the NPS retires.

Fiscal year 2006 $4,000,000 base budget. $800,000 added for seasonal rangers, maintenance staff, natural resources, and other seasonal workers.

Visitation 438,572 visitors (Online says: 388,972)

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