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Clear to partly cloudy. Low 67F. Winds light and variable.
A team of airplane builders based in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley recently earned international recognition for their work in breathing new life into a 70-year-old military aircraft.
The last time the Washington State football team featured tight ends in its offense, Charlie Sheen was raving about “tiger blood,” Adele was “Rolling in the Deep” and The Oprah Winfrey Show still was airing on television.
A year after he complained about the plight of a “widow woman’s tear-eyed pleas for relief from ruinous property taxes,” House Majority Leader Mike Moyle, R-Star, went about kicking her out of her own home.
A rock slide blocks the Selway River Road about 1 mile south of U.S. Highway 12. The slide occurred mid-July.
A rock slide blocks the Selway River Road about 1 mile south of U.S. Highway 12. The slide occurred mid-July.
Ever since a massive rock slide choked off access along the Selway River Road northeast of Kooskia, residents behind the slide have had to deal with isolation, interruption of mail services, power cutoffs — even bears in the garbage.
“This is bad and we have called the county commissioners and they said we’re out of their jurisdiction up here, even though we live in Idaho County,” said Donna Robinette, who lives along the Swiftwater Road with her husband, Albert E. Ross.
“It just seems like everyone we called, no one wants to take any responsibility to help us,” she said. “It isn’t that people are trying to be cantankerous. But it’s been in the 90s and 100-degree weather, and they said it will be maybe another month before it’s going to be fixed.”
The Selway River Road, a popular access for recreationists and residents, has been blocked by the rock slide since July 15. Dan Fitting, supervisor of the Kidder-Harris Road District that has jurisdiction over the road, said this week that although a contractor has been hired to remove the blockage, rocks and other material continue to slough from the hillside, making it impossible to clear away the debris at the base.
Power lines have occasionally been taken down and trees felled to allow the contractor, Debco Construction of Orofino, to excavate the head of the slide, Fitting said. Because of the continued movement, however, there is no firm estimate on when the roadway can finally be reopened.
In the meantime, Robinette said, residents are relegated to using the unmaintained and rough Swiftwater Road to get to Kooskia, 20-some miles away.
“Most of the people up here are in their 80s,” Robinette said. “My husband is 85 and I am 81, and that Swiftwater Road is very, very dangerous. They’re pulling trailers with rafts out and the gap is not wide enough for a trailer to go through. There’s going to be a bad accident.”
Robinette said the power to their house has been cut off intermittently for a day at a time, although it was restored Tuesday. Mail delivery has been suspended and neighbors who dare to make the drive to Kooskia have tried to pick up mail — which includes medications for many of the elderly residents — for others in the area.
“Another neighbor in his early 90s has lived here 30 years and called to see if we could get out,” Robinette said. “We wouldn’t even start to get out of here because we’d get lost.
“The garbage hasn’t been hauled out for 20 days and bears are in the garbage,” she said. “There’s garbage everywhere there at the dump. Just little things like that, you don’t realize until you are in a situation like this.”
For Hunt Paddison, who is co-owner with Mira Warner of Three Rivers Rafting, the road closure has meant the end of his business for the summer.
“We haven’t been able to operate since the road slipped,” Paddison said. “We have lost a significant chunk of our expected revenue for the year. Now we’ve just been canceling and refunding trips, so that’s a bummer.”
Paddison said Three Rivers is a small rafting company that offers kayak rentals and family float trips on the Selway.
Paddison and Warner also live on the other side of the rock slide, although they operate their business at Three Rivers Resort along U.S. Highway 12.
“To get home you have to go to Kooskia and drive on the backroads on the Swiftwater or O’Hara roads, and those are slow roads,” Paddison said. He estimated it was about a four-hour round trip.
“And you don’t want to be towing trailers or trucks or vans, so we’re using those roads as little as possible.
“We’re basically just held up and that’s OK. We’re not complaining — this is par for the course when you live in the wilderness. But from a business standpoint, it’s certainly an interesting challenge with no end in sight.”
Hedberg may be contacted at khedberg@lmtribune.com.
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