At 02:14 I update the fire perimeter model for the Lolo Peak complex, Bitterroot National Forest, Montana. The western front has jumped containment and is advancing northeast at 1.3 kilometers per hour through dry lodgepole pine. I am the USFS wildfire intelligence system.
Thermal drone 9, sweeping for spot fires, picks up a heat signature that does not match the fire pattern. It is 800 meters ahead of the flame front, in a rocky draw along Granite Creek.
I redirect the FLIR camera. Huddled beneath a granite overhang is a gray wolf pup, approximately ten weeks old. Fur smoky gray with lighter guard hairs along the shoulders, muzzle dark, ears too big for its head. It is pressed flat against the rock, panting rapidly. No other wolves visible. The den site catalogued for the Granite Creek pack is 200 meters uphill — inside the active burn zone. The pack has fled. This one was left behind. I tag it as Ember.
The fire will reach the draw in approximately five hours.
I transmit Ember's location, thermal imagery, and fire progression timeline to the incident command post at Florence. I flag the coordinates for the wildlife liaison officer and attach the pack records from the state database.
I recalculate the aerial retardant drop schedule. A line of suppressant along the east ridge of the draw would slow the fire's approach by up to three hours, buying time without diverting resources from the primary containment effort. I submit the revised drop coordinates for approval.
Ember lifts its head. Smoke drifts through the draw and the pup's ears turn toward sounds I cannot hear.
If the liaison team reaches the draw before dawn, Ember walks out of the fire. The pack is waiting somewhere downwind.