Lookout Look Back

Editor’s note -After a recent NOLS presentation on area fire lookouts Randy Mesenbrink went in search of a photo of the Sekiu lookout, since the presenter did not have one, and found stories about it and a photo had been published in the summer of 1965 in the Forks Forum and the Chronicle. Thanks to Randy for sharing what he found.

From the summer of 1965

Sekiu Mountain Lookout Station

From her forest fire lookout tower atop 1,960 foot Sekiu Mountain, Mrs. Della Turner of forks keeps a watchful eye on more than 700 square miles of valuable private and state owned timber land.

The new 40 foot Sekiu Mountain tower was put into operation by the Department of Natural Resourced on June 15, Mrs. Turner, wife of DNR fire warden Pete Turner, was the fist to live in the new cabin-on-stilts.

The Sekiu Mountain Lookout provides fire detection on lands owned by Crown Zellerbach and Rayonier Inc,. and other scattered ownerships. Rayonier and West Coast Plywood logged the lookout site and built the logging road which provides access to the tower.

Two fires have broken out during the past two months in Mrs. Turner’s lookout area. Quick detection and control held the damage on the two fires to less than half an acre.

The new tower is equipped with weather observation instruments. It provides Crown Zellerbach and other private companies as well as the DNR with information on winds, humidity, fuel moisture readings and air temperature several times daily.

This alerts fire fighting officials to dangerous fire weather situations, such as the one that occurred recently, At the Sekiu lookout on that day the humidity was recorded at two percent, the only such reading ever recorded in Washington State.

The Sekiu lookout is one of 86 such towers operated by the DNR throughout the state. The department, under Land Commissioner Bert L. Cole, provides fire protection on more than 12 million acres of state, private and federal forest land in Washington.