By Roger Harnack
Chronicle staff

     NESPELEM – Evacuees were allowed to return home at 1 a.m. Thursday, Sept. 17, after firefighters contained a blaze that raced more than four miles across sage land from the Belvedere area to just outside of town.
     The fire, one of at least six reported by tribal officials, is under investigation, Police Cmdr. Mark Duncan said late Wednesday night. Other fires were reported near Haley Creek, Moses Mountain and Coyote Ridge.
     The rash of fires broke out around 3 p.m. Wednesday afternoon, spreading firefighters and other emergency personnel across the 1.4 million-acre Colville Indian Reservation.
     The largest fire grew to more than 1,600 acres, generally running along four miles of state Highway 155 from the Rebecca Lake Road turnoff to Nespelem.
     The American Red Cross opened shelters at both the Nespelem Community Center and the town’s Catholic church.
     As the fire approached the Colville Tribal Convalescent Center, tribal police raced to nearby homes evacuating residents. Medical personnel also evacuated the convalescent center’s more than 50 residents and staff.
     Some Buffalo Lake Road residents also were asked to evacuate.
     “When the evacuation order was put out, the community really came together,” North Cascades American Red Cross Programs Administrator Barbara Locklear said. “People showed up in trucks to help.”
     Meanwhile, tribal and other assisting fire personnel set up a perimeter around the housing area along Convalescent Center Road, knocking down the wall of flames as it marched down a ridge toward the homes.
     At 11 p.m., the flames looked as though they would overtake the housing area – a solid red glow silhouetted homes, trees and power poles.
     But firefighters managed to halt the fire’s advance.
     “I think the fire departments around here do an excellent job at saving people’s homes,” Locklear said. “No homes burned and everything was saved.”
     Locklear said she heard from tribal residents that firefighters even managed to save a home that was “completely surrounded” by flames.
     As evacuees were sitting down for a snack at 1 a.m., Locklear said they were given the all-clear to return home.
     “We were kind of in shock,” she said, noting that less than two hours before, residents believed their homes would be destroyed.
     An e-mail from Bob Twitchell summed up feelings of Nespelem residents threatened by the fire:
     “The fire was 20 minutes from consuming Nespelem. The flames were high and the smoke thick. Suddenly, prayers were answered in heavenly rain.”
     Rain did come, assisting firefighters working blazes across the reservation.
     As of Thursday morning, firefighters were still monitoring hot spots.
     Officials said nobody was injured in the fires, but a firefighter was injured in a vehicle crash on state Highway 155, just west of the Haley Creek-area fire. (See related story.)
     Investigators have yet to determine the causes of the blazes.