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• "It doesn't happen by accident," the senator said. "It happens because of the hard work and courage of a lot of people at the local, state and federal level."
• More than 400 firefighters have battled the White Draw Fire. On Sunday, a C-130 air tanker crashed, killing four of the six crew members from a North Carolina National Guard unit.
• The fire is now 95 percent contained, and mop-up efforts have been aided by heavy overnight rainfall in the area.
• Edgemont rancher Mark Hollenbeck said locals at the fire's onset tried to tell crews where roads were, and officials responded that there weren't roads there because they weren't on their maps. Hollenbeck said officials were planning to get ambulances out of Custer and didn't know the much closer town of Edgemont had ambulances.
• "They didn't talk to the local fire chief," he said. "They didn't communicate with the locals."
• Fire spokesman Brian Scott said he couldn't comment on the ranchers' concerns as they deal with issues prior to the Type II incident management team taking control.
• Hollenbeck said he'll have to sell at least half of his 250 cattle and 200 sheep because the fire burned between 1,000 and 1,200 acres of grass on his 1,600-acre ranch. In addition to losing about three months of grazing to the fire, the drought has cut into about 20 to 30 percent of its grass production.
• Thune said such losses are particularly tough for ranchers in a year in which drought conditions have caused a significant hay shortage.
• "When you're paying $180 a ton for hay, if you can get it, any rangeland any pastureland you have is enormously valuable," he said.
(Continued on page 22)
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