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Let Forest Fires Burn

nytimes.com

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Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#71

Post by jgh »

coryrc wrote: post #65
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…

Firefighters are dying to protect the private property of people who live in the forests so they can save money not building a fire-safe house. We need regular burns to keep the brush down, but we can't because rich people's houses are in the path. The forest was there first; it's time to stop protecting people from financial loss because of their poor decisions.

I believe, at least in California, households that have taken some effort to make their property more resilient to fire are given higher priority. I heard an interview with a firefighter on the radio talking about this a few weeks back.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#72

Post by sliverstorm »

jgh wrote: post #71
coryrc wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefighters are dying to protect the private property of people who live in the forests so they can save money not building a fire-safe house. We need regular burns to keep the brush down, but we can't because rich people's houses are in the path. The forest was there first; it's time to stop protecting people from financial loss because of their poor decisions.

I believe, at least in California, households that have taken some effort to make their property more resilient to fire are given higher priority. I heard an interview with a firefighter on the radio talking about this a few weeks back.

Similarly, I hear houses that have been allowed to become completely indefensible (e.g., boughs on the roof, no fire clearing) are simply abandoned.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#73

Post by SandersAK »

jonnycoder wrote: post #58
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…

Speaking of eastern Oregon, the environmental lobby has a huge influence on this as they sue the USFS quite often. They never did salvage log from the Canyon Creek fire right?

I don't remember but between hunters, hippies, logging, blm, and forest service it can be a real bureaucratic nightmare. Irony is that they actually all want the same thing.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#74

Post by int_19h »

msla wrote: post #11
knieveltech wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember, you don't hate Mondays, you hate capitalism.

You don't hate capitalism, you hate badly-regulated capitalism. Besides, homes burn just as much in a socialist society.

Ah, but in a socialist society you then get a new home, because the entire population is in the mandatory risk insurance pool for that, effectively.

(Quality of said homes is a different and orthogonal question.)

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#75

Post by sizzzzlerz »

falcolas wrote: post #40
sizzzzlerz wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In the event of a major catastrophe, it really won't make any difference who is carrying the insurance. They're all going to run out of money and will only pay off the early birds or a fraction of the policy's coverage to all. And by major, here, I'm think an 8 earthquake rupturing the San Andreas fault from San Diego to the Tehachapis or a multi-state cat 5 tornado swarm in OK, NE, KS, IA, and MO. Are they likely? Sure but improbable. The joker, however, will be the effect of global warming and what its going to do to the weather.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#76

Post by cakedoggie »

falcolas wrote: post #66
coryrc wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefighters are dying to protect the private property of people who live in the forests so they can save money not building a fire-safe house. We need regular burns to keep the brush down, but we can't because rich people's houses are in the path. The forest was there first; it's time to stop protecting people from financial loss because of their poor decisions.

Rich, poor, farmers, ranchers, middle class; all kinds have property in forests. And firefighters work to protect them all pretty much equally. As for your last sentence, that could apply evenly to any natural disaster. The [ocean|tectonic plates|flood plains|super cells] were there first. Let's stop protecting [hurricane|tornado|tsunami|earthquake] victims from loss due to their poor decisions.

> Rich, poor, farmers, ranchers, middle class; all kinds have property in forests.

And none of them should.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#77

Post by Gustomaximus »

coryrc wrote: post #65
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…

Firefighters are dying to protect the private property of people who live in the forests so they can save money not building a fire-safe house. We need regular burns to keep the brush down, but we can't because rich people's houses are in the path. The forest was there first; it's time to stop protecting people from financial loss because of their poor decisions.

In Australia we regularly have 'back burning' or 'controlled burns' where the fire brigade waits for a cool, non windy day and sets a bush fire around houses. This happens every few years so that when bush fires occur the area around houses has less combustible material and either places dont need firefighters or the firefighters can more easily protect property, letting the fire do its thing in non-critical areas.

Also through bush land they cut roads which also service as firebreaks, that way bush fires hit these gaps and should stop a proportion of the time.

Anyway, my point is I dont know we need to hate on 'rich people's houses' because 1) I would say even more ordinary people have houses in the bush, at least in Australia, and this feels like personal hatred without knowing your area and 2) Australia has clearly shown people can manage an enviroment (with occasional exceptions) to live within a bush/forest fire area.

I'm not sure how supported or funded this is in the states. And in Australia we have large volunteer groups of bush firefighters that help with back burns and when larger outbreaks of bush fires occur to increase manpower.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#78

Post by Gustomaximus »

cakedoggie wrote: post #76
falcolas wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rich, poor, farmers, ranchers, middle class; all kinds have property in forests. And firefighters work to protect them all pretty much equally. As for your last sentence, that could apply evenly to any natural disaster. The [ocean|tectonic plates|flood plains|super cells] were there first. Let's stop protecting [hurricane|tornado|tsunami|earthquake] victims from loss due to their poor decisions.

> Rich, poor, farmers, ranchers, middle class; all kinds have property in forests. And none of them should.

Why? Have you spent time living outside a city?

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#79

Post by strebler »

eesmith wrote: post #35
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…

If the theory were true, then why were the two largest fires in recorded North American history in 1919 and 1950 (which MacDonald, a wildfire expert, missed)? 5 and 4 million acres respectively, significantly larger than 2011 or 2016 Alberta fires.

The data does not support the theory, the fires over the past 70 years have been smaller.

Re: Let Forest Fires Burn

#80

Post by Gustomaximus »

falcolas wrote: post #52
planteen wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you talking about? That isn't true on the plains of North America. The plain was very treeless, save next to water, where there are plenty of trees. Man has created far more barriers - roads, wind breaks around farms, etc. East of the 100th meridian, most land is divided in a perfect grid with roads along section lines in both the US and Canada. Further west, the lines may be further apart, but there still…

Roads don't do much to stop wind. I've never seen many man-made wind breaks which weren't directly related to stopping snow drifts in specific areas. Embers travel over roads remarkably well.

The context is about stopping fires. And roads do serve this purpose well. In Australia we cut roads through bushland for this purpose.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firebreak

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