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> For a hundred years, fire suppression policies prevented necessary fires from occurring in the West, creating a buildup of fuel. Today’s hotter and drier cond

> For a hundred years, fire suppression policies prevented necessary fires from occurring in the West, creating a buildup of fuel. Today’s hotter and drier conditions are priming those fuels, making them more combustible. Thank you for getting the facts correct. The primary cause of "giant fires" is in fact piss poor forest management, egged on by other factors. Controlled, planned, prescribed, forest fires are necessary to replace the natural processes that humans have interfered with. No idea when we'll actually start putting this into practice, but one would hope the US would learn a few lessons after watching nearly half of RMNP burn down in a single summer.

kibwen 3y ago
Prescribed burns have been part of US federal forestry policy for quite a while now. However, I think many state agencies have yet to get the memo.
- dboreham 3y ago
  They are, but once in a while one gets out of control and burns people's stuff.
  - kibwen 3y ago
    Indeed, and state governments are possibly more averse to controlled burns precisely because they're more worried about the political repurcussions in the event that one gets out of control.
- exabrial 3y ago
  State agencies, Locals, among many other things. Also fire resources tied up in "unprescribed" fires
bsder 3y ago
> The primary cause of "giant fires" is in fact piss poor forest management, egged on by other factors. Controlled, planned, prescribed, forest fires are necessary to replace the natural processes that humans have interfered with. The problem is that the only long-term answer is to simply let things burn. You cannot controlled burn the vast amounts of areas that need to burn. I mean, maybe you could, but it would take a VAST amount of money that nobody seems willing to throw around. There is a LOT of land out West in the US. The problem is that once a fire starts, a lot of very loud voices want it put out. And the crying victims play really well on TV. And so, everything gets into "We must do something!" mode.
- exabrial 3y ago
  All good points. There are other tools too though, like permanent logging cuts. I Not an expert, but I imagine you also don't have to burn the entire thing, just the worst sections, or choke point areas that would contain otherwise larger fires.
fukoyize 3y ago
I used to work in wild land firefighting as contractor for the Forest Service. From how my coworkers understood it, everyone got paid more fighting fires than preventing them, and the national budget reflects that [sources needed]. Not only firefighters but also all the contractors, air tanker and helicopter companies, and the retardant manufacturer, Monsanto, are paid well. It’s very easy for me to imagine such interests lobbying in congress to direct more and more funds toward fire fighting rather than prevention efforts.

kibwen 3y ago

Prescribed burns have been part of US federal forestry policy for quite a while now. However, I think many state agencies have yet to get the memo.

dboreham 3y ago
They are, but once in a while one gets out of control and burns people's stuff.
- kibwen 3y ago
  Indeed, and state governments are possibly more averse to controlled burns precisely because they're more worried about the political repurcussions in the event that one gets out of control.
exabrial 3y ago
State agencies, Locals, among many other things. Also fire resources tied up in "unprescribed" fires

bsder 3y ago

> The primary cause of "giant fires" is in fact piss poor forest management, egged on by other factors. Controlled, planned, prescribed, forest fires are necessary to replace the natural processes that humans have interfered with. The problem is that the only long-term answer is to simply let things burn. You cannot controlled burn the vast amounts of areas that need to burn. I mean, maybe you could, but it would take a VAST amount of money that nobody seems willing to throw around. There is a LOT of land out West in the US. The problem is that once a fire starts, a lot of very loud voices want it put out. And the crying victims play really well on TV. And so, everything gets into "We must do something!" mode.

exabrial 3y ago
All good points. There are other tools too though, like permanent logging cuts. I Not an expert, but I imagine you also don't have to burn the entire thing, just the worst sections, or choke point areas that would contain otherwise larger fires.

fukoyize 3y ago

I used to work in wild land firefighting as contractor for the Forest Service. From how my coworkers understood it, everyone got paid more fighting fires than preventing them, and the national budget reflects that [sources needed]. Not only firefighters but also all the contractors, air tanker and helicopter companies, and the retardant manufacturer, Monsanto, are paid well. It’s very easy for me to imagine such interests lobbying in congress to direct more and more funds toward fire fighting rather than prevention efforts.