Of course, with any tragedy, there is blame. While it's true that a large part of the blame lies upon the lack of clearing of brush and timber, that's sort of an easy out. The other side of the story is that the State and Federal governments have done a great job in creating and staffing a fire response infrastructure that has had considerable success in combating fires. So it's a bit of a good news, bad news story.
I majored in Forestry in college and worked for the Forest Service fighting fires. It was a challenging curriculum and certainly the toughest, dirtiest work I ever did. And I came to have an enormous respect and appreciation of our heroic firefighters. I also came to have enormous respect for the nature of fire. It is nothing to be trifled with. And I have always believed that the answers to the problems of wildfires is not simple. In fact, it's very complicated. I've been seeing a lot of comments in the press and over on FB playing the blame game. While understandable, it's just not productive. And unfortunately I know a bit about this subject so when I see someone offering an opinion that is just full of sh*t, it makes me cringe. But a friend has posted the essay below from a guy who is a former Marine and flys for the Forest Service. He has clearly thought about this and his opinions are formed from experience. The points he makes are spot on as is his depiction of how complicated the issue is.
Trying to come up with some concise points on this is a challenge, just like the problem we're discussing. I'll give it a shot. I would like to add that, much like when I was in the Corps, I would be happy to have someone hand me a pink slip and say my services are no longer needed in the present career that I have flying for the US Forest Service. There is much value and meaning in what we do in the reaction to fires, but I don't want to give the impression that I'm a fan of fire because of the industry it supports. I have always said that life in fire has a morally challenging aspect to it...like anything we do, you want to work and spend your time properly, but for us to do that means there have to be fires and that isn't always a good thing.
When decisions were made in the early 1900s to enact a policy of "full suppression" on wild fires, we affected a condition that has occurred historically - naturally and man caused. As the article stated, overgrowth is an issue. I won't dispute that, but it wasn't caused by people who didn't care, which many times these articles seem to lean towards that idea. Looking at just California, you have 33 million acres of forested land to deal with. This makes for an immense task and it isn't one that lends to machinery. There is a balance between logging, building roads, clearing slash, prescribed burning and forest use, scenic value, protection of the environment, etc...
Prescribed fires are employed every year - mostly during the late fall, winter and early spring - to clear under story, burn slash piles and improve forest health. The area that is burned has to be manageable to keep the fire contained and prevent it from becoming something you don't want. There is science and art to a prescribed fire; appropriate environmental conditions (present and forecast), manpower, equipment, a written plan, impact studies. Resources are generally not on contract, seasonal employees are laid off and others are attempting to take annual leave and have a life outside of fire during these more appropriate periods. Typically the areas burned are not greater than a couple hundred acres at a time. Attempting to use this technique on 33 million acres? Challenging to say the least. At the end of the 2018 fire season, which was far worse than this year's, there were dozens of prescribed burns managed throughout northern California very successfully. Are these difficult to coordinate? Yes. Due to this, at times decisions are made to allow naturally occurring fires - lightning caused - to burn in remote/wilderness/areas that Forest Management Officers know need to burn. Sometimes these decisions are good and others they become incidents like the Rough Fire in 2015.
Power lines. Yes, recent fires have been caused by power line issues. I wouldn't attribute them to lack of clearing along right-of-ways based on my observation and close focus on wires throughout the state. With some exception, these power line caused fires have been during high wind events. They don't have to be record winds to cause a problem. Is it crazy that companies have to shut down lines to prevent this? Yes, particularly when you consider the risks associated with reenergizing a line. It's much more complicated than just flipping a switch.
Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI). Not just California but every western state has issues with the WUI. Areas that may have been allowed to burn in the past cannot be addressed that way now because people have decided, for many reasons, to live further out, abutting and within the forests. Clearance of brush and buffers become a problem when one builds up to a boundary where they are not authorized to clear (federal or state land), and/or they refuse to clear because of the scenic value of their location, their desires, etc...Homeowners insurance becomes an issue. Why would a company want to insure a home that is completely surrounded by a canopy of trees? Recent fires - Napa, Sonoma, and others that gained a foothold in large suburban subdivisions - are forcing wild land and structure fire fighters to consider this a new fuel type. Flammable materials used in building lead to extreme heat and explosive conditions in the WUI. Again, wind plays a huge factor in ember cast, flame heights, fire progression. Surprisingly, during this year's Saddle Ridge Fire that we worked on, the large subdivisions were spared. I am interested in finding out why that was - proper structure protection, fire-resistant building materials/techniques, luck?
Bug kill. Going back to some of the forest density issues, Pine Bark Beetle infestation has decimated many of the western forests, particularly in the Sierra Nevada. 150 million + standing dead trees, orange with needles, have become another new fuel type. Fire in large stands of bug kill is dramatic, to say the least. We've all seen images of Christmas trees afire...imagine thousands of acres of that. How to clear and remove bug killed trees is an almost insurmountable problem in itself.
Prior to these past few weeks, the 2019 California fire season was practically non-existent. We joked that "forest raking" must have been successful! The areas where the most recent fires have occurred are not typically "forests" that anyone would have cleared in the first place. Lighter fuels, minus wind, are generally easy to catch and don't become extended attack incidents. Also, Southern California has not had a Santa Ana event of any significance for many years. Some relief from the drought conditions made for higher fuel humidities, wetter conditions in the higher elevations, and less of an opportunity for fire to spread. The irony is the wetter winters usually produce large grass crops that lead to greater fire danger when coupled with wind. I cannot say enough about how much the weather, terrain, and environmental conditions affect a fire.
Arson. I won't speculate on recent incidents, but I have worked on many man-caused intentional fires. Why? I don't want to delve into the psyche of one who would do that, but they achieve results in areas that likely wouldn't have burned without assistance. I suspect these people also know that starting a fire near power lines gives cover to their actions. This is just my opinion.
I trust this gives you some idea of why this issue of wild land fire isn't a quick fix. Not to be political but threatening to withhold federal $ isn't a good solution. I don't have the answers, as a friend of mine told me yesterday, "I'm just a fixer" once the problem starts, but I do know that many people from all sides of management, the "-ologists," and fire fighters care deeply about the forests and what they do.
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