I remember the July 4, 1999 blowdown well. I was on Kawnipi Lake in a 3 man Wenonah canoe with my 2 brothers fishing for walleye when the storm came right at us. The walleye action was "unbelieveable" before the storm hit. The skies began to darken and my one brother teaches science in a high school in Cary, North Carolina and he said that it looked like an F2 was approaching. well we paddled fast over to a small island about 200 yards away. The staightline winds were unlike anything we had ever seen. We had to tie the canoe to a couple of trees and we hunkered down  in low area behind some rocks ... the water in Kawnipi was blowing up out of the lake. I thought that it was a tornado ... it sounded like a frieght train going by. If I recall correctly it was over in a about 10 minutes. It was an unbelievable experience ...I thought we were goners for sure. We made it back to our base camp on Mckenzie Bay and there was no real apparent tree damage there. We surmised that the storm began around the Kawnipi area and headed towards Ely... but were unsure. A couple of days later we saw several airplanes in the air to the south, which was unusual. We didn't know that the winds caused so much damage until we portaged our way back to Prairie Portage and Canadian Border Outfiiters. We encountered many trees that had been cut by chain saws on our portages. CBO told us that they were hit hard. If i remember correctly they said the straight line winds were 7 miles wide by 12 miles long??? but I may memory may be off. I also was up in Kawnipi on a 10 day solo trip via kayak. I remember  travelling back thru Agnes to Prarie Portage and watching the the woods burn...it was crazy...walking on portages that were charred black. I remember the winds died down on my way back thru the cliffs of Agnes and I watched the underbrush beneath the tall pines burning. I ran into 2 firefighters who were waiting to get picked up by helicopter. They had cut down the several small trees and brush on a small island in Agnes. They were tired and needed a break and ready to go home. It has been interesting to see the many new trees that have sprung up after the big fire. It did'nt take too long for the forest to regenerate.