A group of Lower Mainland hobbyists is paying tribute to a B.C. landmark destroyed in the 2023 wildfires.
Images of the historic Nahatlatch Lookout tower going up in flames were among the most iconic and heartbreaking to emerge from last year’s devastating fires.
The structure was razed by the Kookipi Creek fire, which burned thousands of hectares between Lytton and Boston Bar.
The tower had long been a popular spot for 4×4 drivers, and it’s now being honoured by a group that drives scaled-down, remote-controlled versions of those same vehicles.
The Lower Mainland Radio Controlled Crawlers Association has built a detailed scale model of the tower, as a part of a miniature-scale terrain park for the RC trucks they drive.
“I think it looks fantastic, I think it really cued into a lot of the details, we’ve seen pictures, some of our guys have actually been up there, and noted details and stuff,” explained group member Darren Hamaoki.
“We just tried to pack it full of as many details as we could that replicates the real thing, even down to the little fire finder scope inside the unit.”
The track, dubbed the Rock Den, is still a work in progress, as the group clears more trails and builds more structures.
But the crawlers say honouring British Columbia is behind a lot of the work.
“We thought with this park that we created here …we want to take notable B.C. buildings and recreate them in scale,” added Coleby Larsen.
The original Nahatlatch Lookout tower was built between 1956 and 1958, and had a fire spotter stationed there every year until the early 1970s, when improved technology replaced fire watch towers.
It was officially decommissioned as a fire lookout tower in 1993, but quickly became a popular destination for hikers, ATV clubs and geocaching enthusiasts.