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There's that, too. It's the forest version of technical debt. You can build it up for a while, but if it doesn't burn, when it does, get out of the way... Th

by Syonyk 5y ago

There's that, too. It's the forest version of technical debt. You can build it up for a while, but if it doesn't burn, when it does, get out of the way... The huge crown fires of the last decade aren't how forests are supposed to burn. A "standard" forest fire is a lower intensity event, burning along the debris on the floor, taking out a few trees (usually older/weaker/dead ones), but it doesn't come through as a wall of several hundred foot flames, incinerating everything in its path. That's a fairly new feature for forest fires, and it's going to take a long time to get rid of all the built up debris.

asdff 5y ago
We need to just catch up and actually fund these controlled burns. It doesn't help that lands might be managed by different forms of government depending on where it is, and they all have different policies and funding levels to this sort of thing. When you look at Mexico its an entirely different story than even nearby southern california. Fires in Mexico in wildlands have historically not been fought, so there is much less fuel, and they don't get so unnaturally large and catastrophic like they do in the US and Canada.