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To limit risks, US public urged to act before summer wildfire season
May 6, 2023LOS ANGELES, California: With the approach of the US wildfire season, officials from West Coast states are bracing for the potential risks and highlighting the benefits of conducting prescribed burns, and a widespread educational campaign has been implemented to encourage people to create fire buffers around homes.
Hillary Franz, Commissioner of Washington State’s Department of Natural Resources, is working on reversing negative perceptions about preventative fires.
“Prescribed fire is not bad and is not dangerous. We actually need more of it on the landscape and we need to be bringing fire in under our terms and at the right times,” she said, as reported by Reuters.
In mid-April, a crew comprised of approximately 50 forest firefighters gathered some 30 miles north of Spokane to burn dry wood and debris on the ground, which can help further fuel wildfires.
While the test fires were lit ahead of a full prescribed burn, Andrew Stenbeck, the East Uplands District Manager for the Northeast Region of Washington State Department of Natural Resources, stopped the crew’s work and made a phone call to DNR’s meteorologist back in Olympia.
Due to incoming rain and high humidity conditions, the prescribed fire was later cancelled.
“It is a frustrating emotional roller coaster. You will have days when you are absolutely certain things are going well and then something changes,” Stenbeck said, according to Reuters.
California experienced 7,490 wildfires, which burned 362,455 acres, caused nine deaths, and affected 876 structures, damaging 104 of them in 2022.
During a recent visit to California’s state capital region in Sacramento, US fire administrator Dr. Lori Moore-Merrell stressed that fire agencies must continue informing the public about the need to protect their homes.
“It is important that people make sure there is space between their vegetated fuel and their homes. Once we have a wildfire, embers move quickly. And if it’s a wind driven wildfire, then it will ignite,” Moore-Merrell told Reuters.
