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Fire lookout · Valley County, Idaho

Pilot Peak Lookout (Payette National Forest)

Also known as Pilot Peak

Pilot Peak Lookout in the Payette National Forest began as a 1919 log cabin, gained its L-4 cab in 1954, and was listed on the NHLR in 2020.

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Access unknown

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

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
Yes, you can drive up
Staffing
Staffed during fire season (as of undated)

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Two-story buildingL-4 cab on a 10-foot concrete baseThe design: L-4
Built of
Logs
Built
1919
Height
10 ft (3.0 m)
Elevation
8,075 ft (2,461 m)
Agency
Payette National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Valley County, Idaho
Coordinates
45.17400, −115.52704
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-pilot-peak-payette-national-forest

View from the cab

What you see from the 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.

Downloads about 4.0 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. 1919 Built12x12-foot log cabin on the ground; first structure on the site.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1919 and 1954
  3. 1954 BuiltNew L-4 structure on a 10-foot block with an enclosed tower; the current lookout.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com
  4. No record between 1954 and 1974
  5. 1974 StaffedKnown staff listed for 1974-1975 by Idaho Fire Lookouts.Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  6. 1985 FireSavage Creek fire; lookout ordered evacuated after the fire jumped Elk Creek.Source: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  7. No record between 1985 and 2010
  8. 2010 StaffedCaroline Huntley listed as staff for 2010-2011 (Idaho Fire Lookouts). Keeping Watch dates the Huntleys' lookout work to the early and mid-2000s.Sources: idahofirelookouts.com, cdil.lib.uidaho.edu
  9. 2020 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered on the National Historic Lookout Register, October 3, 2020.Source: nhlr.org
  10. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

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 8 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Pilot Peak Lookout is in the Payette National Forest, in Valley County, Idaho, about 10 miles west-northwest of the Big Creek Ranger Station.1 The first structure at the site was a 12-by-12-foot log cabin built directly on the ground in 1919.2,1 The lookout standing today is an L-4 cab, built in 1954 on a 10-foot concrete base.2,1 Keeping Watch gives 1919 as the build year, which matches the first cabin rather than the 1954 cab.3,2

The National Historic Lookout Register says the tower is usually staffed during the fire season.2 Idaho Fire Lookouts describes it as staffed every year and lists known staff for the mid-1970s, along with Caroline Huntley for 2010 and 2011.4 Keeping Watch, a University of Idaho collection of lookout interviews, pairs its Pilot Peak entry with an interview with Jim and Caroline Huntley, who it says staffed lookouts in the early and mid-2000s.3 The two sources date the Huntleys' work to different years, so the record is not settled on when they worked here.4,3

In July 1985 the 3,000-acre Savage Creek fire spread across Elk Creek, and a newspaper item quoted on a lookout list page says the Pilot Peak lookout was ordered evacuated that Monday.5

The National Historic Lookout Register added Pilot Peak on October 3, 2020.2 No source consulted reports the tower being moved, closed, or rented out since then.

Idaho Fire Lookouts lists Pilot Peak as drive-up and staffed.4 None of the sources spells out visitor rules, so treat it as a working Forest Service lookout and check with the Payette National Forest before planning a visit.

  1. Pilot Peak Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/pilotpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Pilot Peak Lookout (Payette National Forest), National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/id/pilot-peak-lookout-payette-national-forest/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Pilot Peak, Keeping Watch, University of Idaho Center for Digital Inquiry and Learning, https://cdil.lib.uidaho.edu/keeping-watch/items/pilot-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  4. Pilot Peak Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/west-central/pilot-peak-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  5. Pilot Peak - Forest Lookouts, Idaho Lookouts (weebly), https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/pilot-peak1.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

Pilot Peak Lookout - 2012
Pilot Peak Lookout - 2012 (2012)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
1956
1956 (1956)Photo: University of Idaho, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Norton Ridge L.O.
Norton Ridge L.OPhoto: the Dave Bula collection and Mark Schreiter, via firelookout.com · source
Norton Ridge L.O.
Norton Ridge L.OPhoto: the Dave Bula collection and Mark Schreiter, via firelookout.com · source
Norton Ridge L.O.
Norton Ridge L.OPhoto: the Dave Bula collection and Mark Schreiter, via firelookout.com · source
Pilot Peak Lookout
Pilot Peak LookoutPhoto: idahofirelookouts.com · source

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Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: what it is built of, design, height, staffing, photos, 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
  4. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) Gave us: photos, 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
  5. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  6. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, staffing, 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

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