This. Cheap, solar powered, slow moving UAVs or something like that would be ideal for this. Also, for those HNers that haven't learned about California fores

This. Cheap, solar powered, slow moving UAVs or something like that would be ideal for this. Also, for those HNers that haven't learned about California forests: Part of reason we have massive fires today is because in the early 1900s we didn't understand that forests in California depended on fire for regrowth. Loggers didn't like big fires burning down their precious trees, so we suppressed fire with great prejudice[1] - even though the Native Americans used low-intensity fire frequently to manage the forest and we knew that! [2] So, today, we're still dealing with "insane fires" that we basically set up a century ago when we let much fuel accumulate in the forest. It's still going to take some time (see: decades) before all this excess fuel sorts itself out. [1] http://ucanr.edu/sites/forestry/files/78651.pdf http://ucanr.edu/sites/forestry/files/78651.pdf page 5 [2] ibid page 2