In the autumn of 1977, the Eastern Red Forest Area encountered a rare forest fire. The situation is grim, and the Forestry Bureau mobilizes the families of employees around the world to participate in the fire fighting and defend the homeland. Most of the boys in the middle school were urgently transferred into the line of fire, and I was one of them.
On the night of September 28, 1977 (the sixteenth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar), the fire was launched
Take a 10-wheeled truck across the Motor Office Bridge and head towards the Canoe River. The air suddenly became cooler and the sky seemed darker. Cars on the road into the mountains, one after the other. Through the light pillar of the headlights, I can see the billowing orange dust raised by the vehicles in front of me. The sky in the distance was reflected in the red of the burning forest fire, and in the black mountains, there were countless torch-like fires, stretching endlessly.
The air was mixed with a strong smell of grass and ash and dust, and the clear night sky was shrouded in smoke and could not see the stars. From time to time, in the dry drains on both sides of the gravel road, there are three or three people sleeping there, allowing vehicles to speed from side to the side without moving. In the thick smoke, there was a feeling of going to the battlefield. The car sped up on the potholed gravel road, throwing us high and falling down, causing a series of screams.
In the night, you can't see around clearly, only the distant meandering fire like a torch, constantly changing its form as the vehicle travels.
I don't know how long it took, but I received the instruction to get out of the car.
To the south of the highway is a large meadow without burning, and to the north of the highway is a steep hillside. Our task is to form a fireproof barrier around the boundary of the highway, to clear the dead grass and shrubs north of the highway, and to prevent the fire from developing southward.
About 50 people lined up along the north side of the road with long snakes, cutting grass and shrub branches with sickles. In the dry autumn, the dry grass and shrubs were covered with dust, and when touched, the dust spread and choked on the throat. It is said that the fire will soon be here, everyone is a little nervous, and few people are talking. Sweat ran down their faces, and with the dust, painted everyone's faces.
It was estimated that at midnight, an order was given to rest in place to monitor the fire. Everyone camped in the open air on the south side of the road.
A sweat that had just come out burrowed into the thatch pile he had cut, although several people were crowded together, but they were also cold and shivering, and they could not sleep with their upper teeth and lower teeth. When I set off, I didn't wear cotton clothes in my hurry, and I didn't expect it to be so cold at night.
Late autumn, frost falls, it's too cold. He went into a cement culvert on the highway and blocked two openings with grass. There was no wind chill inside, but the cement culvert was cold. Or not, people inside the culvert, people outside can not find, in case to transfer is not abandoned and left behind? In addition, there are often vehicles driving on the road, and the rumbling sound overhead makes it impossible to sleep, if a snake is drilled into the seam of the culvert pipe..... Thinking of this, several people fished out of the culvert and came to the road.
It was already the second half of the night, the smoke had faded, and I saw the stars. Two people carry a poplar tree to run for warmth.
The east is covered with fish belly white, and the sky is about to light.
September 29, 1977
After a night of on-site experience, cold protection at night was a big problem, and the superiors decided to take us home to wear cotton clothes.
October 2, 1977 (camp in an old tent)
The car pulled us to an unknown place.
On the south side of the highway, a large area of overheated towers was burned black, and the lid between the black towers was covered with black grass and ash, and the sparse shrubs trembled in the autumn wind.
It is very warm at noon, and in case of accidents, it is necessary to supplement enough dry food every day. There are many cars in the past, and people who do not pull people are generally delivered. No matter which unit's car comes and blocks one by one, those who stop climb up and load the steamed buns into their pockets.
Half a pound of white-noodle steamed buns, steamed like bread, slightly sweet. When the bag could not fit, it was carried in a string with branches.
It was dark, and we were like the British stragglers in the Dunkirk evacuation of World War II, disheveled, gray-headed, with chapped lips and no formation. Moving his tired body and following the person in front of him along a simple path, he did not know where to go or what to do. Time passes slowly.
All the way to the east. The night sky is crisp and crisp, starry and scattered the smoke.
Found a faded tent. Inside was empty, with a large bunk with bare planks and a horizontal stove made of gasoline barrels that stretched out the window, with several stumps and scattered firewood on the ground.
Running around for a day, either standing or walking, two legs are sore, this is the ideal camp!
With the experience of freezing, no one wants to suffer again. Regardless of the three seven twenty-one, immediate action began, some people cut a lot of dry grass and spread it on the Chase shop, found firewood, and built a stove tent and immediately had a temperature inside. It warmed up, and chase shops were quickly occupied. There were still many people who had no place to settle on the ground, and the ground was also covered with thatch, thick. Do not hesitate to lie down immediately, otherwise there will be no such place. I struggled to find a place to lie down, and my legs were put on someone else's body without a place to put them. The tent was full of people lying in all directions, and there was no order. In the haze, I felt some people come in again, too lazy to open their eyes, not knowing where they were and how they slept huddled with us. That night was very warm, and in the morning I got up sweaty, and it was crowded with people.
October 3, 1977
During the day we still watched the fire, and at night the car pulled us to the Canoe River Forest Farm, where we camped at the school on the hillside.
Sleeping at a desk and chair all night is much better than in the wild. When I left the next day, everyone was a little in love.
October 4, 1977
Leaving elementary school, we came to a large house with doors facing west, like a newly built theater, empty. Nothing happened in the morning, it was a rest. Departure in the afternoon, not sure where to go.
For several days, I have been eating steamed buns and drinking landscapes, and I have not even pickled vegetables. However, a person's grain ration is only 27 kilograms, and the fine grain is only 8 kilograms, and it is also very satisfying to be able to eat white-faced steamed buns every day.
The rear began to send salted cucumbers.
People with experience in lighting fires know that fire is not where the fire is thrown, because if the fire really burns head-on, people will not have time to avoid it, and they will undoubtedly die. Therefore, the first mountain fire is to clean up the embers after the fire has passed, so as not to recur when the wind direction changes. Another important task is to clear the fire, in the place where the fire is to burn, the flammable materials such as dead branches and grass are cleaned up in advance, so that when the fire comes over, it will be naturally extinguished because there is nothing to burn.
Now I understand that the task of dozens of people in our group is to clear the fire on the side of the road.
Look at the mountain field that has been engulfed by the fire. The overheated trunk stood scorched black and bare, as if to indict the madness and ruthlessness of the fire. The mountain field was covered with black scorch. The dense hazelnut trees now had only a few charcoal sticks stuck in the bare scorched earth, and a trace of residual smoke was emitted weakly. Occasionally, a breeze blows, rolling up layers of black ash, telling endless grievances.
What a pity, this larch forest, birch forest no longer see the lush, leafy scene before...
It's dark again. Here comes a car, let's act now. In the panic, I don't know who gave a small young tree as a tool to put out the fire. It turned out to be a "standing trunk" tree on fire, like a cabinet torch burning. In the distance, I looked at the red glow and was frightened.
That night, I slept on a small mound on the south side of the highway. On one side is the highway, the other three sides are the overheated towers are still smoking, and the small mounds are like an isolated island.
The charred black tower heads were one after the other, poking with branches, and inside were red charcoal. No one dares to go down. As you know, going down with your feet becomes a roasted sweet potato.
At night, from the charred outer gap at the head of the tower, you can see the bright red light inside, everywhere. There was some fear. For safety, we poured the head of the tower near the small mound with water from the kettle, steaming white with "shi la la la".