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Let Forest Fires Burn

nytimes.com

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Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#31

Post by SandersAK »

Some forests are self-regulating when it comes to fire. Some forests are not. What defines forest is actually pretty complicated, even for Federal and state agencies. Controlled burns work in conjunction with thinning practices and bone-piling (stacking big burns away from other areas).

The root of the problem has been and continue to be that structurally we separate "fuels" and "prevention" teams in the forest service. Where Fuels deals with assessing when and how to burn, and Prevention operationalizes it and also does fire fighting.

Lastly, fire management suffers from a lack of talent and shared learning as fire career paths involve people moving to different regions which are geographically incredibly diverse. You don't fight fire in the east side of Oregon like you do in Florida.

The lack of cohesion, mixed with a serious lack of funding, and a lot of common misconceptions publicly leads to a mishmash of fire management across the country.

source - was a firefighter. left because of all these issues.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#32

Post by mschuster91 »

falcolas wrote: post #21

Speaking as a Montanan here. The policy of "let some fires burn" has been in practice for a few decades now in our corner of the woods. Ever since the Yellowstone fire in the 80's, we've focused our efforts on containment instead of extinguishment (i.e. make a best effort to keep it away from human settlements); letting land lost to the fires just burn out naturally while stopping them from claiming too much land. Sh…

> Grass fires can move even faster than forest fires, given a wind to push it along.

In earlier times, farm fields actually were separated by bushes, patches of rocks, tiny rivers, whatever. Humans have flattened all of this, in order to make really huge strips of farmland that can be worked on really, really efficiently by machines. Not only has this practice destroyed the living space of small animals like rabbits or birds, but it also contributes massively to this problem as there's nothing left to stop or slow down winds :(

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#33

Post by falcolas »

nitwit005 wrote: post #28

The missing step is often that we continue to let communities pop up in these areas that we fully expect to periodically burn down. Of course, we often still let people build their houses in flood planes, but we seem to be slowly getting better at that.

Or in zones where there are catastrophic earthquakes on a regular basis. Or hurricanes. Or tornadoes. Or blizzards.

> we often still let people build their houses in flood planes

The best farmland is on flood plains; good luck with holding them back.

Let's be honest for a moment: there's no place in America which is safe from every regularly occurring natural disaster. Yet we still live here.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#34

Post by falcolas »

mschuster91 wrote: post #32
falcolas wrote: post #21

Speaking as a Montanan here. The policy of "let some fires burn" has been in practice for a few decades now in our corner of the woods. Ever since the Yellowstone fire in the 80's, we've focused our efforts on containment instead of extinguishment (i.e. make a best effort to keep it away from human settlements); letting land lost to the fires just burn out naturally while stopping them from claiming too much land. Sh…

> Grass fires can move even faster than forest fires, given a wind to push it along. In earlier times, farm fields actually were separated by bushes, patches of rocks, tiny rivers, whatever. Humans have flattened all of this, in order to make really huge strips of farmland that can be worked on really, really efficiently by machines. Not only has this practice destroyed the living space of small animals like rabbits…

Yeah - though at least we've learned a little from the dust bowl lesson.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#35

Post by eesmith »

strebler wrote: post #15

Sure, sure, let the fires burn. It's an easy argument to make when it's not your property. What about when the fire does over $3 billion dollars in direct damages, burns 1.5 million acres and forces the evacuation of over 80K people [1]? I'm fine with tax dollars going towards trying to prevent that. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Fort_McMurray_Wildfire

One of the arguments, which the NYT piece mentions, is that decades of fire suppression causes a fuel buildup so that if/when a fire does occur, it is much larger, more dangerous, and harder to manage.

For example, https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2016/0504/Did-fi... points out: "In order to prevent fire like this week’s, Alberta has engaged in a robust fire suppression program, says MacDonald. But because the province has suppressed natural fires that burn off underbrush ever 50 or more years, forests are full of fresh tinder.

“Alberta has engaged in a robust fire suppression program that changed the age structure of the forest,” MacDonald told the Monitor. “Typically, forests in that part of Alberta would burn every 50 to 200 years. But with strong fire suppression, there has been a tremendous buildup of fuel.”"

As a politician, would you rather say "we'll have a forest fire in the area every 10 years" or "we'll make sure there are no fires" .. and conveniently or optimistically omit the "until after I'm long gone, but then we'll have a real doozy of a blaze which will be worse than all of the little fires put together".

In addition, as that Wikipedia article points out, fire fighters came in from other provinces, the national government, and even South Africa. Do you think the local people paid for all of that? Effectively this fire fighting acts as an insurance subsidy.

It's possible to build houses to withstand wildfires, as people have done in Australia and southern California. These designs work best when fires are more frequent, because those fires are less intense, with less fuel to burn. However, these designs are also more expensive.

If people are convinced that the fires will be suppressed, they are not going to spend the money, and the building codes won't change to require better wildfire resistance. Nor is it easy for individuals to switch to safer building designs because when the fires do come they will be much more intense than it should have been without decades of fire suppression.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#36

Post by sizzzzlerz »

falcolas wrote: post #33
nitwit005 wrote: post #28

The missing step is often that we continue to let communities pop up in these areas that we fully expect to periodically burn down. Of course, we often still let people build their houses in flood planes, but we seem to be slowly getting better at that.

Or in zones where there are catastrophic earthquakes on a regular basis. Or hurricanes. Or tornadoes. Or blizzards. > we often still let people build their houses in flood planes The best farmland is on flood plains; good luck with holding them back. Let's be honest for a moment: there's no place in America which is safe from every regularly occurring natural disaster. Yet we still live here.

Absolutely true. But we need to expose the dangers of building and living in these hazardous areas and make the owners share significant portions of the costs of protecting them. Here, in California, you can buy earthquake insurance but at a high premium and high deductabl but everyone is quite aware of the fact that the earth can shift any time. The same should be the case for building in areas subject to wildfires, or avalanches, or tidal surge, or tornadoes, or hurricanes.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#37

Post by notatoad »

mschuster91 wrote: post #32
falcolas wrote: post #21

Speaking as a Montanan here. The policy of "let some fires burn" has been in practice for a few decades now in our corner of the woods. Ever since the Yellowstone fire in the 80's, we've focused our efforts on containment instead of extinguishment (i.e. make a best effort to keep it away from human settlements); letting land lost to the fires just burn out naturally while stopping them from claiming too much land. Sh…

> Grass fires can move even faster than forest fires, given a wind to push it along. In earlier times, farm fields actually were separated by bushes, patches of rocks, tiny rivers, whatever. Humans have flattened all of this, in order to make really huge strips of farmland that can be worked on really, really efficiently by machines. Not only has this practice destroyed the living space of small animals like rabbits…

what i see in rural alberta still looks like most farm fields (i.e. each quarter section) are separated by a line of trees, bushes, or at the very least roads or irrigation ditches. windbreaks are no less important to agriculture now than they were 100 years ago.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#38

Post by namlem »

SandersAK wrote: post #31

Some forests are self-regulating when it comes to fire. Some forests are not. What defines forest is actually pretty complicated, even for Federal and state agencies. Controlled burns work in conjunction with thinning practices and bone-piling (stacking big burns away from other areas). The root of the problem has been and continue to be that structurally we separate "fuels" and "prevention" teams in the forest servi…

Do you think it would help to hold some sort of conference every year or two about firefighting techniques and science?

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#39

Post by notatoad »

aphextron wrote: post #6

The problem with this is local politics. "Let wildfires burn" sounds great when it's not your multimillion dollar vacation home going up in smoke. Yes, in the long run it would be better for everyone involved. But we humans are anything but longsighted when it comes to dollars and cents.

I don't think "let wildfires burn" is an accepted strategy anywhere that those fires could be threatening homes. It's a policy for wilderness fires, where it threatens a community it's not better in the long run for everyone involved. It would be disastrous to let a fire rip through a town just to reduce the fire hazard.

It's entirely possible to do proactive controlled burns and fuel reduction near towns, and let the fires burn when they aren't threatening a town. Letting fires burn and controlling, directing, and managing the fire are not mutually exclusive.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#40

Post by falcolas »

sizzzzlerz wrote: post #36
falcolas wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or in zones where there are catastrophic earthquakes on a regular basis. Or hurricanes. Or tornadoes. Or blizzards. > we often still let people build their houses in flood planes The best farmland is on flood plains; good luck with holding them back. Let's be honest for a moment: there's no place in America which is safe from every regularly occurring natural disaster. Yet we still live here.

Absolutely true. But we need to expose the dangers of building and living in these hazardous areas and make the owners share significant portions of the costs of protecting them. Here, in California, you can buy earthquake insurance but at a high premium and high deductabl but everyone is quite aware of the fact that the earth can shift any time. The same should be the case for building in areas subject to wildfires,…

> make the owners share significant portions of the costs of protecting them

Well, practically speaking, we do. In the form of taxes, which are redistributed according to need by FEMA and associated agencies. This is definitely one place I would not trust a for-profit insurance company given the typical cautions around fire insurance for a home - use it only as a last resort or find yourself unable to get coverage.

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