On an afternoon last summer, Brian Flynn sat on his back porch after work. As he drank a beer, he noticed a column of smoke rise above Grand Mesa. Despite all of the intel gathered during his workday that the Spring Creek fire was extinguished, the plume suggested his mission had changed.
The next day, the wind pushed the fire toward a part of the plateau south of Parachute, where he knew Ute artifacts were scattered. Flynn and his team rushed to defend them, thinning the forest surrounding a wickiup, a dwelling made of sticks and brush, to provide a fire break.
In the end, the wickiup was saved but the team could not make it to another Ute campsite in time. The fire burned through the site, exposing stone tools and a hearth to erosion.