Burns criticizes firefighters, says they didn't heed ranchers
By JENNIFER McKEE
Gazette State Bureau
HELENA - Republican Sen. Conrad Burns chastised a group of firefighters over the weekend for doing a "poor job" dousing a 92,000-acre blaze near Billings, a state report shows.
Burns and the firefighters - members of the Augusta Hot Shots from the George Washington and Jefferson National Forest in Virginia -were at Billings Logan International Airport awaiting flights, according to Burns and Forest Service representatives.
Burns approached the firefighters and told them they had "done a poor job" and "should have listened to the ranchers," according to a report prepared by Paula Rosenthal, a state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation employee who was sent to the airport to speak with the senator.
Rosenthal wrote in her report that she received word of an "altercation" between Burns and the Hot Shot crew. The crew had been in Montana working on the Bundy Railroad fire near Worden.
whole story- and e-mail responses... CONrad is really catching hell on this one....
http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles/2006/07/27/news/local/45-burns.txt