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Fire lookout · Idaho County, Idaho

Dan Ridge Lookout

Clearwater National Forest tower in Idaho County, Idaho: L-4 cab on a 30-foot pole, built 1934, destroyed 1973. No source we read describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1973 according to three sources; no source we read describes what remains at the site.

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.

Access

Access unknown

We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.

Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
Idaho Fire Lookouts labels the site hike-in.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a towerL-4 cab on a 30-foot poleThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Clearwater National Forest
Land
Unknown
Location
Idaho County, Idaho
Coordinates
46.47255, −114.46011
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-dan-ridge

View from the cab

What the lookout saw from its cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

This lookout is gone. The view is reconstructed from its recorded site and a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 3.8 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1934 Built30-foot pole tower with an L-4 cab, per firelookout.com and Idaho Fire Lookouts; the Forest Service list gives a 30-foot pole L-4 tower built 1934Sources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, fs.usda.gov
  2. No record between 1934 and 1973
  3. 1973 DestroyedDestroyed 1973 in all three sources; none of them gives a causeSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, fs.usda.gov
  4. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Dan Ridge lookout stood on the Clearwater National Forest, about 12 miles east-southeast of Powell Ranger Station, in Idaho County, Idaho.1,2 The listed elevation is 7,405 feet.1,2 The Forest Fire Lookout Association gives its coordinates as 46.47255 and -114.46011.3

The tower went up in 1934. It was an L-4 cab on a 30-foot pole.1,4,2 A Forest Service list of Clearwater lookouts, compiled in June 2016, gives the same year and the same 30-foot pole.2

Three sources agree that the tower was destroyed in 1973.1,4,2 The Forest Fire Lookout Association lists it as a tower that is gone.3

Idaho Fire Lookouts marks the site as a hike-in lookout.4 We found no source that describes what, if anything, remains at the site today, and none that says whether the public may visit.

  1. Dan Ridge Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/danridge.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Clearwater National Forest Lookouts, USDA Forest Service, https://www.fs.usda.gov/media/259185 (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Idaho Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/id (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Dan Ridge Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/selway-region/dan-ridge-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: name, location, county, type, status, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  2. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  3. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) Gave us: dates, links idahofirelookouts.com · No licence stated; facts only (coordinates, status/built/destroyed year parsed from each entry's short excerpt). Thumbnail photos mirrored with credit per the project's photo policy. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, visiting details, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.