Ironic thing about the Reading Fire and all the upset it caused would be if it helped us contain this one.
Regarding dozers in the wilderness for this fire, how are dozers working out anywhere else right now?
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100 feet of bare earth vs current conditions? Ya, Mother Nature must be thinking “aww, look at them try, silly humans”
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TRUE.
When I told my son I was clearing the land behind me* with a McLeod to get 100 feet of clearance, he asked what a true distance might be. Smart-alecky me said, “really about a mile”.
*“Old Lady and the McLeod” cleared 1/4 acre by hand just because I didn’t think the owners would let me move in with them if MY house burned.
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Are dozer lines more effective as the landscape transitions out of trees and into brush or so these conditions still send embers > 100’ in brush? I’m learning so much from all everyone’s responses. Thanks!
Dozers are a great tool when used at the right time. (As with every other tool in the tool box). If you have a fire spotting a mile ahead of itself because of the wind…your containment line should be at minimum a mile wide, and still probably not big enough. Dozer lines also fail when they aren’t supported with hose lines, crews, retardant and every other tool that can and should be used given the current situation. Every situation is different and requires different strategies and tactics. There isn’t ever one right answer for every fire.
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FS sup can authorize chainsaws and helicopters in the wilderness. Dozer use is authorized by the Regional Forester
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I remember Forest Supervisor Dick Henry authorizing CDF to use both helicopters and chainsaws in the Thousand Lake Wilderness Area. When one of the helitack captains (I believe it may have been Darrell Kelley) asked, “What the hell are we supposed to do in there?” he got Dick’s answer. I think that may have been in 1987.
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Here’s a good thread to revisit today with Dozers, National Parks and decision making. Cheers
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Morning Woodrow
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Morn’n Hoss
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Couple good HEQBs, some CWN skidders and some dozers, LACOFD size… those crews and saws will be happy to see after about one shift in that area
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CA-RNP, Mt Vision Fire 1996 Pt Reyes National Park 12K acres and 30 larges homs destroyed another 100 damaged, hundreds threatened along HWY 1 Inverness down to Bolinas. Dozer Lines stopped the southward, northward spread and also the west spred down into Inverness (SRA). Would have been a disaster without the dozer line. As always in the fall fires the great Pacific fuel break was able to handle westward spread. The BAER Team had all signs of the dozer lines gone by the following fall.
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Oh for sure
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Haven’t heard that one before, thanks for the info
All good info but this is not wilderness, this is NPS DOI, Different agency different rules
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We were the first team on the North Fork fire that started on the Targhee forest in 88’. It burned about 500 acres on the forest and they picked that up with dozers in that flat lodgepole fuels. When the dozers hit the park boundary they shut them down, next day it went 5000 and when all was said and done it was over 400,000. Who knows whether the dozers could have picked up the rest of it, but.
Sholly (Chief Ranger at the time) showed up to one of our planning meetings wearing a t-shirt depicting Rangers rolling with laughter and saying “The Forest Service wants to do what with our fires”. I’m glad I was Dep. LSC and didn’t have to deal too much with the politics. I wouldn’t have wanted to be in the IC Larry Caplinger’s shoes
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The park can do what they want for sure, just takes a lot of phone calls and running up and down the hallways
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On the A-Rock took a lot of “running up and down the halls” in Washington
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Dozers in parks or not, we’ve still got to use them where they’re going to be effective. With this fire being spread by spotting from the get-go, and a ton of snags that’ll keep giving us more firebrands, they’re probably not going to help us pick it up direct.
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Simple question: How can a non-firefighter or person (agency administrator) with little fire experience have a “comfort level” with an emerging fire or make critical, time sensitive decisions with lack of understanding or appreciation for the potential or life and community risks?
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