Scenic Tokatee Golf Club in McKenzie Bridge, Oregon, is serving a different purpose this week.
It has become a staging ground for hotshot crews battling the Lookout Fire raging through the Willamette National Forest about 50 miles east of Eugene.
Smoke from the Lookout Fire as well as the Bedrock Fire is filling the skies. The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality has issued an air quality advisory, according to the Eugene Register-Guard. On Tuesday, DEQ issued a similar advisory for elevated levels of ozone in Salem, Eugene-Springfield, the Portland-Vancouver metro area and the Medford area.
Tokatee Golf Club announced Monday it was closed until further notice. According to the club’s website, the construction on the course started in 1964 and nine holes were opened in 1966. The second nine opened in 1969. The course was built on an old-growth logging site.
The big challenge was land clearing because much of the area had been an old-growth forest logged in the 1940s. The stumps had to be “blown” with dynamite, then the roots dug out and piled to be burned. A few stumps were left to show the size of the trees and how they were felled with cross-cut saws.
The Willamette Valley has been under a heat wave, with temperatures reaching 100 degrees. A large part of the U.S. Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Region is under a red flag warning issued by the National Weather Service on Monday, reports the Register-Guard.