488 



Canadian Forestry Journal, April, ipi6. 



machines burning wood fuel ; 2 

 steam locomotives burning oil, and 

 a camp burning wood for cooking 

 and heating. I should say the pine 

 operator could expect to see start 

 on his works an average of not less 

 than five fires a year. 



The elements of damage done by 

 fires in the logging woods are, first 

 and foremost, lost time ; then, the 

 cash loss by destruction or reduc- 

 tion in the value or efficiency of 

 equipment such as donkeys, loaders, 

 logging line, chutes, railroads, tres- 

 tles, or camps ; last, the value of the 

 product is lowered when logs are 

 damaged. 



Sources of Loss. 



Take the element of lost time. A 

 fire is usually handled by the rail- 

 road section crew. It is not unusual 

 for a five-man crew to work a day on 

 an ordinary fire, leaving one man to 

 watch it for 48 hours afterward. 

 This means $21 in lost time. A 

 larger fire may require a donkey, a 

 camp crew, or the whole woods 

 crew. It is not at all unusual for a 

 part of all of the mill crew to turn 

 out in an emergency. A fire which 

 requires the whole logging crew of 

 an ordinary double band mill will 

 cost the operator, in lost time, about 

 $400 per 10-hour shift. These figures 

 refer to direct labor charges only 

 and do not take into account lost 

 operating time of expensive equip- 

 ment or the supervisory and over- 

 head charges which are going on 

 while the plant is turning out no 

 product. 



If it is expensive to fight fires, why 

 not let them burn? This would be 

 good business if it were not for the 

 fact that it would very probably be 

 still more expensive in damage to 

 equipment. A fire practically never 

 ruins a donkey engine beyond re- 

 pair, but $500' or $600 damage is a 

 frequent occurrence. Burning the 

 sled out from under a machine, for 

 instance, would mean a loss of 

 about $400, and it will yard no logs 

 for several days. Logging cable is 



easily damaged, and the loss of the 

 lines on one machine — say, 1,300 feet 

 of yarding line and 3,000 feet of back 

 line — costs $375. Repairing a line 

 burned in two may be put down at 

 $5 per splice. 



Cost of Repairs. 



The ordinary fire on a logging job 

 does not destroy a chute — it about 

 half destroys it. Repairs can be 

 figured at $750 per mile of chute 

 burned over. The most serious 

 single equipment loss is the burning 

 of a main line railroad trestle. It 

 means that the main artery of the 

 woods work is cut and the product 

 of all work must stand still until the 

 damage is repaired, at a cost of $3.50 

 per running foot of trestle burned. 



I have seen, an hour and a half 

 after a spark dropped out of the fire- 

 box of a moving donkey, an entire 

 camp wiped out as thoroughly as 

 though packed off by a cyclone. All 

 that was left was a large black cloud 

 of smoke, which cost about $2,200. 

 Logs on the ground burn on the end, 

 or, where they lie across others, 

 pockets burn out of the sides. A 

 fire seldom destroys them, but it re- 

 duces their value between 10 and 15 

 per cent. 



Forest products rank second 

 among the industries of Canada and 

 are worth $180,000,000 a year. The 

 important uses for wood in Canada 

 are for lumber, lathes, shingles, 

 poles, railway ties, pulp wood, hard 

 wood distillation, cord Avord, hem- 

 lock bark for tanning, etc., etc. In 

 the manufacture of lumber about 25 

 per cent, of the tree is left in the 

 forest, in the form of stumps, tree- 

 tops, branches, 'leaves, etc., while at 

 the saw mill about 35 per cent, more 

 is discarded in the form of bark, 

 sawdust, edgings, deal ends, shav- 

 ings, etc. So that under the present 

 conditions only 35 to 40 per cent, of 

 the original tree is converted into 

 finished lumber or other useful 

 articles of products. 



