Forrest Ownbey a legend of the name game

Recipe for naming a forest fire: Mix Sourdough Canyon and a blazing forest fire. Add humor. Makes one Burnt Bread fire.

Summer fire season means that, like hurricanes, forest blazes are known by their names. But instead of following a strict set of alphabetical first names set by a central agency, fire commanders have some leeway in bestowing a title.

“Oh, we always try to have a little fun with it,” said Steve Harris, who fights fires for the state Department of Natural Resources, with a chuckle.

Many forest fires are named because they’re close to a certain geographical location or they start near landmarks – some with catchy names. This summer, the Dirty Face fire burned on the south side of Dirty Face Mountain. The School fire started near School Canyon.

“There’s a lot of geographical places out there with interesting names, which makes it pretty easy to have fun,” Harris said. Fire managers often look to a map for distinctive place names, or sometimes they’ll come up with something completely unique.

A legend within fire manager circles, Forrest Ownbey had his own methods for naming forest blazes that kept crews guessing.

One year, Ownbey named fires after the artist of the song playing on the radio when the first call came in. Another, he named for various beer makers. He could produce names like “Mount Spokane Journey,” “Cusick Mellencamp” or “Lone Mountain Blue Ribbon.”

“We thought for sure management was going to crack down on him,” Harris said. “He was probably the most creative on naming them.”

The search for the best name for a fire is an unspoken competition, said Phil Carroll with the National Interagency Fire Coordination Center.

“We get some real creative firefighters and dispatchers who look for some way to make it something other than the Goat Creek fire or something boring,” Carroll said. “There are some creative folks out there that have two nearby creeks that they can put together and make something funny out of it.”

Sensitivity is always a concern when naming fires, Harris said. Fire managers don’t want to appear flippant when some fires could burn homes or harm people.

But for the firefighter who gets to name the blaze, it can be an opportunity for a lighter moment on the job.

“In this job, sometimes there’s not a lot of opportunity for artistic expression, so firefighters look for opportunities like this,” Carroll said.