When a 10-year-old clearcut let loose a torrent of
mud and debris last November, killing four people and obliterating
a house in Douglas County, Ore., some said logging caused the
tragedy (HCN, 12/23/96). Now the victims’ families are taking that
claim to court with an $11.3 million lawsuit against the two
companies that owned and logged the steep canyon walls above the
homes.
Logging contractor Don Whitaker Logging
Inc. and landowner Champion International Corp. would not comment
on the case. But Douglas County district forester Steve Truesdell
suggests the fatal landslide was a natural event triggered by
record rainfall last year.
“Those people that
died, I’m sorry for them,” Truesdell says. “They were just totally
stupid to put their house at the bottom of a draw.”
Others blame current logging practices. “We have
studied this to death,” says Mark Hubbard of the Oregon Natural
Resources Council. “We know for sure that logging and road-building
on steep slopes increases the risk of landslides.”
Oregon’s state board of forestry has asked
loggers to voluntarily avoid hillsides above homes for the next two
years, while a special panel defines high-risk slide areas and
discusses logging techniques.
Hubbard is not
encouraged. “What we need is a true mandatory moratorium” on
steep-slope logging, he says. “What we have is a promise to study
the issues some more. That isn’t going to save any lives.”
* Danielle
Desruisseaux
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Loggers sued for fatal landslide.
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