Tucson Region

Tense families wait as fire advances on Mt. Graham

Wildfires kept the Weech family from their traditional Fourth of July celebration on Mount Graham this weekend. Flames less than two miles from the family cabin canceled the annual get-together usually attended by 300. Instead, 25 family members are camped out together in Pima, 10 miles west of Safford, watching the Gibson and Nuttall fires through binoculars. "We're pretty stressed out," said Daryl Weech, 42, whose family has owned the cabin on the mountain since 1938. "Emotions are riding close to the surface." Weech is president of 14-member Columbine Cabin Owners Association. With the Columbine area at risk, he's serving as a liaison among fire officials, cabin owners and his large extended family, which has deep roots on the mountain and is spread across Arizona from Tucson to Mesa. Hyrum Weech, Daryl's great-grandfather, was among the first group to explore the mountain in the 1870s. The Weech family gave the area its name, after the columbine flower that grows there. Columbine is less than a 90-minute drive from Weech's mother's home in Pima and only a mile from the University of Arizona's Mount Graham telescopes. The Weeches and the 14 other cabin owners hike, fish, canoe and relax there during the summer months. Columbine cabin owner Doug Taylor is also keeping a close eye on the fire from the front yard of his house in Pima. "When you can see flames in the day, you know it's an inferno," he said. Taylor, 59, was 6 when he helped his father, Farr Taylor, build the log cabin in 1950. He's doing his best to keep calm and stay optimistic. "I don't think Columbine is going to burn up," Doug Taylor said. But he can't help but wonder if the 20 dead trees and dry brush that surround his weekend getaway make the property more vulnerable to flames. "There are people in the U.S. Forest Service who don't want those trees cut down, even though they are deader than a doornail," Taylor said. Cabin owners lease their property from the Forest Service and own only the structures built there. Weech said that environmental concerns, particularly strong efforts to protect the endangered red squirrel, have made it hard for residents to maintain their properties since that could destroy the natural environment. "We tried to clean up," he said, sharing Taylor's frustrations. "We would have done it if they had let us because we knew this day would come, but there are so many rules and regulations." Weech said firefighters plan to surround the Columbine area with a bulldozed trench designed to stop the flames from hitting the log structures. Taylor said if the area is hit by the fire, it would be devastating to residents, since most owners have vacationed in the area for generations. All the houses are 50 years or older, he said.