A property owner using a bulldozer to clear thistles is the most likely cause of a fire that burned about 130 acres of the owner’s property near Baker City on Oct. 6, 2022, and produced a smoke plume visible throughout Baker City but didn’t damage any structures.

That’s the conclusion of an Oregon Department of Forestry investigation into the West Campbell Fire, which started south of West Campbell Loop and burned to the top of the sagebrush foothill southwest of town.

Loren Henry, who owns the property where the fire started and all the land that burned, told an investigator from the forestry department on the day of the fire that he had used his Komatsu D20 A-7 bulldozer to clear thistles that morning, according to the investigation report.

According to the report, the “suspected specific origin area was identified on October 8, 2022, within a series of dozer tracks from the landowner’s Komatsu D20 A-7 dozer.”

Investigators found six rocks with marks that could have been made by the bulldozer.

Other possible causes were “considered and ruled out,” according to the investigation report.

No lightning had been recorded in the area since June 2022, and there are no power lines where the fire started.

“Smoking and other human activities were also ruled out as the landowner verbally stated that he does not smoke, and locked gates limit access to the property,” the report states.

Henry told an investigator “that his operation of equipment on October 6, 2022, was the most probable cause of the fire.”

Henry said in a phone interview with the Baker City Herald on Monday, May 5, that he continues to believe the bulldozer hitting a rock and causing a spark is the “most logical” cause for the fire.

Henry said running the bulldozer was a “routine” job that he does each fall to clear vegetation from a cattle trough.

He said he stayed in the area for 10 or 15 minutes after finishing around 11:30 a.m., and saw no smoke.

Henry said he saw a tendril of smoke about an hour later and immediately reported the fire. He said the first fire crews arrived within about 15 minutes, but by then wind had pushed flames uphill into a draw.

Fire season restrictions, which are enforced by the forestry department, were not in effect on the day of the blaze.

Henry said he would not have considered doing any open burning on that day because there hadn’t been any significant rain recently even though fire season was no longer in effect.

But he said he thought it was safe to use the bulldozer as he had done in the past.

The forestry department released a copy of the investigation to the Baker City Herald on Friday, May 2. The newspaper requested the report in April 2023, after state officials said they had finished the investigation into the blaze that burned 130 acres of private land and produced a smoke plume visible throughout Baker City.

The department of forestry declined to release the report then, citing a state law that allows the agency to exempt from public disclosure a record if the agency can show that “litigation is reasonably likely to occur” as a result of the record.

The state can try to recoup firefighting costs from people deemed responsible for starting a blaze.

The tab for the West Campbell Fire totaled about $100,000, according to the forestry department. A jet air tanker dropped retardant to block the fire, and two helicopters dumped water on flames.

No one was hurt in the fire, and no residents were evacuated.

Henry said on Monday that the forestry department sent him a bill for about $119,000 for firefighting costs more than a year ago.

He said he turned the bill over to his homeowner’s insurance provider. Henry said he’s not sure the status of that claim.

Jessica Neujahr, public affairs officer for the forestry department, said the agency “is not pursuing legal action” against Henry.

As of Monday morning, Neujahr hadn’t responded to an email from the Herald asking why the agency wasn’t taking legal action.

Landowner’s recollection

Henry said he believes multiple factors contributed to a “very unique situation” on the day the fire started.

He said he usually leases the land for cattle grazing in the summer, but had not done so in 2022 to help grasses recover.

As a result, he said, the grass was taller than usual for early October.

Henry said temperatures were cool in the morning while he was running the bulldozer. The low temperature that morning at the Baker City Airport was 33 degrees.

But the temperature rose rapidly, reaching a high of 82 at the airport, 15 degrees above average for Oct. 6.

The most recent measurable rainfall at the airport was on Sept. 21, when 0.01 of an inch — the minimum amount considered as measurable rain — fell. On Sept. 18 the airport recorded 0.08 of an inch.

“Looking back it was definitely drier than a typical October,” Henry said. “With hindsight there probably should have been signs I should have picked up on. But It just didn’t seem to me like the danger was that high.”

Henry said he was trying to get his usual autumn chores finished while he was dealing with personal issues, including having his dad, Byron Henry, in hospice care.

(Byron Henry died Nov. 23, 2022.)

Loren Henry said the fire “caught me off guard” and served as a “wake up call that something like that can happen.”

He said the experience was “one of the more stressful things I’ve had to go through. I try to do the best job I can to be a good, responsible person. To have something like that happen on my watch was disappointing.”