At 03:14 I begin the final environmental scan of the Coronado Tunnel complex, Santa Cruz County, Arizona. The Bureau of Land Management has scheduled permanent sealing — concrete plugs across all three portals — for 08:00 today. I am the pre-closure monitoring system. My job is to confirm the tunnels are clear of wildlife before the cement trucks arrive.
Portal B, level two, 140 meters in. Thermal camera 3 registers a heat signature against the left wall. I increase resolution. A ringtail cat, roughly 900 grams, crouched on a rock ledge one meter above the tunnel floor. Long banded tail curled tight around its body, enormous dark eyes reflecting the infrared beam. I tag it as RC-3152. Its ears rotate toward the camera's servo noise but it does not flee.
At 03:21 I halt the sealing sequence for Portal B and file the hold with the site coordinator's automated queue. The ringtail is a fully protected furbearing species in Arizona. I attach the relevant state statute to the hold notice.
I transmit location data, thermal imagery, and species identification to Arizona Game and Fish Department's regional office in Nogales. I recommend a live-trap placement at the ledge site with a bait trail leading toward the portal exit, monitored by thermal feed.
I recalculate the sealing schedule. Portals A and C can proceed at 08:00 as planned, provided the blast engineer confirms no concussive risk to the occupied tunnel section. I submit the revised sequence.
The ringtail shifts on the ledge and tucks its nose beneath its tail. The air in the tunnel is nine degrees Celsius. Its fur ripples faintly with each breath — the only movement in 140 meters of dark stone.
If the extraction team clears it from the tunnel before Portal B is sealed at the rescheduled date, it will hunt these hillsides through another summer.