In this issue …
Colorado Education ...........2
Front Page News ...............2
Hunting licenses ................3
Cat Tales ............................4
Vaccinations.......................4
Share the Trails..................4
93rd year............................5
Economic future.................5
Disaster plan......................6
$55K grant .........................6
August character................6
Pet pigs..............................7
Phunque’s Desk.................7
Neighborhood Register......8
Elk study ............................8
Scholarships ......................8
Wilderness poet .................8
Public notices................9-11
Marketing local...................9
Technology class .............10
Job fair .............................10
$10 Million project ............11
Obituary............................11
Vern Rose
School news ....................12
Care and Share ...............12
County fire ban lifted
Dolores County Sheriff Jerry Martin has lifted the fire ban.
“Please use extreme caution when conducting burns of any kind,” urged
Sheriff Martin.
Thursday, August 1, 2013
12 pages ~ 50¢
Volume 73 ~ No. 29 ~ Dove Creek
Dolores County, Colorado
San Juan National Forest Lifts All Fire Restrictions
The San Juan National Forest will rescind its current Stage 1 fire restrictions in place for lower
elevations, effective Tuesday, July 30, 2013 at 9 a.m. This means that all fire restrictions are how
lifted in the San Juan National Forest due to decreased fire danger.
For more information, contact the San Juan Public Lands Center at 970 247-4874.
Relay Under the Stars …
More than 80 people participated in the Relay and raised
$1,750 for needy families in our community. The Relay was a
STUD fundraiser
Helicopter crash claims a life - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Helicopters were used to transport equipment
used for a seismic project on Forest Service land
for nearly a year, but no longer. After a fatal
crash July 16 near County Road 15, helicopters
are grounded.
Witnesses said they heard a loud “pop” and
the helicopter plunged to the ground. It was flying at low altitude when the incident took place.
Sheriff Jerry Martin said that Billings, MT
resident Almon Blain died on impact. He was
the only passenger in the helicopter when it
crashed.
The cause of the crash has not been estab-
lished, or at least released. The helicopter was
taken to an FAA hanger in northern Colorado.
The Billings Montana Flying Service aircraft
was doing seismic exploration for Kinder Morgan. Four ground crew members nearby escaped injury.
Helicopter crash
Helicopters were used to transport equipment
used for a seismic project on Forest Service land
for nearly a year, but no longer. After a fatal
crash July 16 near County Road 15, helicopters
are grounded.
Witnesses said they heard a loud “pop” and
the helicopter plunged to the ground. It was flying at low altitude when the incident took place.
Sheriff Jerry Martin said that Billings, MT
resident Almon Blain died on impact. He was
the only passenger in the helicopter when it
crashed.
The cause of the crash has not been established, or at least released. The helicopter was
taken to an FAA hanger in northern Colorado.
The Billings Montana Flying Service aircraft
was doing seismic exploration for Kinder Morgan. Four ground crew members nearby escaped injury.
July weather on
Cedar Point
July weather delivered a few
showers to most places. On Cedar
Point Oscar Semadeni’s U.S.
Weather Station recorded 1.56
inches of moisture.
The warmest temperature was
July 11 when it hit 95. The coldest
temperatures were recorded July
28 and 30 when it dropped to 52
degrees.
Helium plant plans to build a compression plant next to Kinder Morgan
If everything goes according to
plan, Air Products will become Dolores County’s first helium producer in 2015. Four representatives
of the company, which is based in
Allentown, PA, attended the Planning Commission meeting July 29
and left with the group’s blessing.
A public hearing was scheduled for
August 26 and if the project clears
that hurdle, a hearing before the
County Commission will be scheduled about a month later.
Walter Nelson served as
spokesman for the company. He
explained that there are many uses
for helium. Besides blowing up
balloons, helium is used in the
manufacture of fiberoptics, in
welding, diving, and purging fuel
tanks. Liquid helium is the coldest
thing on earth. Nelson said that the
Four Corners has the largest deposits of helium known to man,
and that’s not much. Helium is created from radioactive decay, so helium and uranium are often found
close to each other.
Most of what Kinder Morgan
pumps out of the ground is carbon
dioxide, but .3% of it is helium.
Nelson explained that with Kinder
Morgan increasing its production,
it has become economically feasible to build a helium extraction
plant.
The proposed helium extraction
facility will be built beside the carbon dioxide compressor station and
it will be a substantial facility. It
will have to be able to take Kinder
Morgan’s entire stream of gas, de-
crease the pressure from 700
pounds to 300 pounds and separate
out helium. The majority of the
stream will no longer contain helium and will be re-pressurized to
700 pounds and turned back over
to Kinder Morgan where it will be
pumped up to 2,000 pounds and
sent to Texas. The pressure of the
remaining gas that contains helium
will be decreased to 150 pounds
and will go through a reverse distillation process. Jim Johnson, an
engineer for Air Products, explained that since helium is the
coldest thing on earth, the distillation process keeps cooling the gas
until only helium is left.
At one point in the discussion
Planning Commission Chairman
Steve Garchar asked if the eve
height of the building has to be 40
feet high and Johnson said it will
have to be that tall to house a distillation tower.
Nelson had a slide presentation
that bragged on Air Products
virtues. He said the company provides products to over 50 companies and employees over 20,000
people. Annual revenues topped 10
billion dollars last year and the
company has helium extraction facilities in several countries. The
company’s most recent plant is in
Wyoming and will extract helium
from natural gas. The company’s
first plant was built in 1982 in Gruver, TX, and in 2015 Nelson hopes
that Cahone will be the newest.
The Air Products plant will cover
9.62 acres and will consist princi-
pally of two buildings; one to compress the air stream and another to
cool the helium to a liquid state.
After that is accomplished, it will
be hauled out in a tanker truck.
Nelson said the plant will produce
a truck load a day, or perhaps every
two days. He estimated that the
plant will employ 12 to 14 people
and the company will try to hire locally. Nelson said it will take about
100 people to build the plant and
Garchar urged him to run a bus.
“That will cut down the traffic a
lot,” he said.
Nelson said that liquid nitrogen
will be used to help cool the helium, about a truck load each week.
Garchar noted that the application
Continued on page 2