The loss of colleagues

We are saddened by the deaths this fire season of our wildland firefighter colleagues. Already this has been a long fire season and there is still hard work for wildland firefighters to do.

Please note the article in the Washington Post about the August 6 helicopter crash. Of the people the helicopter carried, nine are missing and presumed dead and the other four are severely burned.

This tragedy – added to the recent losses of Fire Chief Daniel Packer and firefighters Andrew Palmer, John Hermo, Josh Speigel, and Robert Roland – brings the total deaths in California to 15 this fire season, according to the Washington Post. The count is rounded out by the civilian found in a burned-out house in Paradise, California.

A great website to visit is the Wildland Firefighter Foundation. This site's focus "is to help families of firefighters killed in the line of duty and to assist injured firefighters and their families." It also lists firefighters who have lost their lives since 2002.

Our hearts go out to the families who have lost their loved ones.

And to those of you out on the fires, be careful, and come home safe.

Let It Burn

The continuing fires in California are causing wildfire policy makers to take a hard look at fire management. One of those policies is "let it burn." The Sacramento Bee had an interesting article on this management technique.

Parts from the article:

"Federal land managers in California are retooling their firefighting strategies to capture more of the public safety, economic and environmental benefits of letting wildfires run their natural course without overwhelming the public with smoke and destroying homes.

"That's a tough balancing act in the nation's most populous state, which already endures the smoggiest and grittiest air in the country. But in a select few remote national forests, parks and wilderness areas, ecologists say, the federal government has been weaning itself off Smokey Bear's admonitions with measurable success.

"'We didn't have any injuries. We didn't burn any houses, and we cleared out 15,000 acres of dense vegetation that hasn't seen fire in decades and, in some places, a century – and that's a good thing,' said Brent Skaggs, a U.S. Forest Service fire management officer who let nature take its course under close watch – and tricky weather – in the Clover fire that was recently contained in the Sequoia and Inyo national forests."