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Wildfire and the Global Carbon Cycle 

It has long been conventional wisdom that CO2 emissions were essentially neutral in global carbon fluxes since fires also promote vegetation regrowth and uptake of CO2. However, the more frequent and severe fires that the US and the world is experiencing as a result of climate change and fire suppression have made many begin to question whether that balance continues to exist. More ...

 

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Wildfire and Beetle Kill Across the Rocky Mountains

 By Josh McDaniel

Lodgepole pines throughout the Rockies are dying. The culprit is a tiny beetle, no bigger than some of the letters on this page that girdles the trees and also releases a fungus that interrupts water flow within a tree. The mountain pine beetle has killed 1.5 million acres of lodgepole pine in Colorado alone since 1996, and in 2007 the beetles killed an estimated 3.9 million acres of lodgepole pine across the Rocky Mountain region. The extent of beetle kill has raised concerns that the risk of catastrophic fires is spreading along with the outbreak. More ...

 

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New HRO Information

(19MB wmv video file posted 9/11/08)  Introductory video - Creating a better mindset for wildland firefighter safety and survival.

 

 

 

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Changing the Face of Fire Management in the Northern Rockies
AMR is many things—it is the latest buzzword, it is also a substantive change in wildland fire policy, it is letting a fire burn akin to wildland fire use, it can also be going direct in an aggressive effort at fire suppression. Still confused? Most people, even those involved in implementing AMR, have a difficult time explaining exactly what AMR is.  More...

 

 

The Grand Mesa National Forest in western Colorado has never had a fire like the Coal Creek Fire, a 1,485 acre blaze creeping up the slopes of the Grand Mesa near Kannah Creek. This is the first large fire on the forest to be managed as wildland fire use for resource benefit. Approaches to managing wildfire in the West are changing rapidly, and the Coal Creek Fire is an excellent example of how fire managers are shifting their views of fire as well as their strategies and tactics. More...

There is considerable misunderstanding about what constitutes a “debris flow.” The media frequently gets it wrong, referring to these events as mudslides. But, the term mudslide does not really do a debris flow justice. They are much more than mud. A debris flow occurs when a steep hillside or mountain slope becomes saturated with water and then releases and begins sliding down a watershed. More...

There are many ready to proclaim that cheatgrass has won the battle for the west. The 2007 fire season would certainly attest to that claim with cheatgrass fueling range fires in Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming that covered hundreds of thousand of acres. Not everyone is ready to surrender to cheatgrass though. Zion National Park is tackling the cheatgrass problem head-on.

Click here for audio slideshow (7:45) 

In 2007, a complex of fires in and around the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge—eventually named the Georgia Bay Complex—consumed over 500,000 acres across southern Georgia and northern Florida. While state and federal officials are busy preparing for another active fire season they have implemented a number of programs to help recover from last year’s round of fires, and also to better prepare Georgia’s forests for the challenges it will face with a continuing drought. More...