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Pearce wrong about Little Bear firefighting efforts
Ellen Wedum
If Congressman Pearce thinks that the U.S. Forest Service should be able to respond to fires faster than on foot, he and his fellow Republicans should stop cutting the Forest Service budget.
There’s a lot of misinformation being spread about the initial efforts to contain the Little Bear fire. I have pieced this account together mostly from the online log available on the USFS website.
“Monitoring” is a totally inadequate term to describe the efforts that were made to contain the fire during the first five days.
On Monday, June 4, the fire was spotted at 3:30 p.m., and the size was estimated at 1/4 acre. A helicopter immediately flew in two firefighters who started trying to clear the area around the fire with chainsaws. They were operating at 10,200 feet in rugged area with treacherous footing on a 70-percent slope.
The firefighters cut down 300-foot tall trees to clear the area around the fire, which was then about 1/2 acre in size, until it was too dark to operate safely. Congressman Steve Pearce has no idea of what it is like to work for hours on a smoky, low visibility, 70-percent, steep slope.
Other considerations to keep in mind – the firefighters cannot work at night, but the fire can continue to burn. Also, there was a 300,000-acre fire burning in the Gila, and fires in Colorado, that needed firefighters too.
Tuesday morning, June 5, 20 members of the Sacramento Hotshot crew hiked to the fire. The only helicopter available was not some fancy Blackhawk assault vehicle that could carry that large a crew, and if Congressman Pearce thinks that the USFS should be able to respond faster than on foot, he and his fellow Republicans should stop cutting the Forest Service budget (4-5 percent every year for the three years since they became the majority party in the House).
The hike was followed by a full day of trying to clear the area around the fire under the harsh conditions of steep, rocky terrain and high altitude. Cutting down the trees was hazardous, care had to be taken to avoid injury to the crew. I live in Cloudcroft, and Highway 82 down to Alamogordo is considered dangerous because it has a 6-percent slope in some places, so try to imagine what it is like to work on a 70-percent slope!
Almost containing the fire
Cutting continued on Wednesday and Thursday, June 6 and 7, and attempts were made to drop water on the fire. Dropping 75 gallons (about 625 pounds of water) was ineffective as the trees were so close together that the water just wet the tops and never reached the ground. Some soft-sided bladders of water, again with a limit of 75 gallons, were delivered.
Long hoses could be attached to these bladders (called blivots) so the fire could be more directly attacked, but it must have been very difficult to wrassle a 650-pound floppy blivot and all that length of hose to the areas that needed dousing. This would also reduce the number of firefighters available to continue clearing with chainsaws.
By Friday, June 8, at about 1:30 in the afternoon, the two dozen firefighters had just about contained the fire. Then the winds picked up, and spot fires appeared outside the contained zone.
Two air tankers were immediately ordered, but remember that the density of the forest made it very difficult to get the water to the ground where it was needed. The spot fires started spreading. The Hotshots were in danger.
Additional crew arrived at 3 p.m. Friday, and by 6:30 p.m. total resources on their way to the rapidly expanding fire were at least nine hotshot crews, 36 engines, seven water tenders and multiple aircraft. By 8 p.m. a 56-member IMT1 team had also been requisitioned. But none of the crews could work in the dark, especially in that rough terrain.
The fire continued through the night, and by Saturday morning, June 9, it had spread to 8,000 acres and was out of control. Firefighters worked frantically in 90-degree heat, with winds gusting to 30 mph, but by nightfall the fire had doubled in size to 15,000 acres and evacuations had been ordered. My friends in Alto received a telephone notice to evacuate at 5 a.m. Saturday, and by the time I tried to reach them, about 2 p.m. that afternoon, the phone service was completely disrupted.
Who made the budget cuts?
That evening Congressman Pearce stormed into town and demanded that the Lincoln National Forest staff, which was trying to help coordinate approximately 430 firefighting personnel as well as organize evacuations, drop everything so he could tell them how badly they were handling the emergency.
He even stated, “I just came from the other side of the state where we’ve got a 300,000-acre fire more or less going right now.” But he didn’t make the connection that, with two fires going in our state, firefighting resources were strained to the limit, and the last thing that was needed was for him to cause an additional disruption.
As Lincoln National Forest supervisor Robert Trujillo said, “Right now, Mr. Congressman, we have an active fire out there and I don’t see that this conversation is very productive, with all due respect.” But Pearce insisted that “it is productive to say ‘Who made the decisions?’”
Maybe so, congressman. Maybe now it would also be productive to ask, “Who made the budget cuts?” But at that time theoretical analysis and scapegoating on his part were irresponsible and counterproductive.
Wedum lives in Cloudcroft and is the Democratic candidate for N.M. Senate District 34.
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Also, here‘s a relevant story from last week, providing a discussion on how this year’s fire season is more-than-likely the new normal.
I agree with rrvb. I have “hardipanel” siding on my manufactured home and have had my lot thinned. The friends I mentioned in the article had their lot thinned, too, and they had only a few trees damaged (along the side of the road, ironically enough).
And also artiofab. Community-based, volunteer logging might be the way to go.
No matter what anyone here wishes to argue, we need to face the fact that the planet–for whatever reason–is heating up at a rapid pace that is going to continue to cause catastrophic events that threaten our way of life for a very long time to come. QUIT ARGUING ABOUT IT: DEAL WITH IT.
Science–not uninformed or dangerously misinformed politicians–will lead us to the answers of how to balance our needs with the health of the planet. We already have an incredible amount of information about the healthy management of our forests and wildlife garnered from research by very smart folks who are less interested in politics than fixing problems. Some people listen to their angry friends who lose their homes and make develop their own “facts”–my friends have Ph.D’s in areas like Forestry and Conservation Biology and have devoted their lives to working on these issues. And I promise you–in their private lives they are Republicans, Democrats, and Independents. But they can all seem to come together on issues that clearly are supported by facts with no problem.
The people to who we have ceded actual power to do anything in regards to things like conservation or forest management–but NONE of the deep knowledge, expertise or commitment to actually DO anything–spend all their energy fighting with each other and thwarting all the important and necessary work that we could be doing to prevent all these tragedies.
Unfortunately for us, we dirty every single thing in this country with political and economic interests. As if every interpretation or opinion must be valid. Well, math is math, and science is science, folks. You accept the results or you dither around while the forests burn.
If you presented at the emergency room with a broken leg, would you want to wait for however long it took for two local politicians in the waiting room to decide whether you deserve to be treated? Whether you or the government should pay for it? Whether a hard cast or splint was more appropriate? Whether you were entitled to pain medication for an injury? Probably not. But that’s basically what we have when it comes to natural resource science, and you wonder why the forests are on fire.
It should be obvious that a large part of the blame for damage to private houses was the fault of the owners. Anyone who builds or buys a combustable house in the middle of a forest is begging for trouble. I have a house in the Lincoln Forest built of fireproof insulated concrete with a 24 guage steel roof. Trees and brush have been cleared for a considerable distance in all directions. Firewood is stored in steel containers, the soffetts are non combustable cement board, decks are concrete, there is nothing to burn for at least 50 feet in every directions. Why do the State and City codes not prevent the location of combustable housing in the forest? It costs a bit more but the fire is going to come someday, just get ready.
w. harkey
EW-aif, yes, the forest is more dense right now than current (and probably future) precipitation levels can support. This means that natural fires will be more powerful than ‘normal’, at least until they burn up the ‘excess’ trees. So small community-based logging and brush clearing is useful, as long as it can be regulated. Large-scale logging just allows quicker-growing (and more flammable) grasses, shrubs, and brush to move in.
TJ, the problem with your statement, “heaven forbid we hold our government accountable and make them actually do their jobs” is that there are a bunch of other people lobbying for them to do their jobs differently, and they seem to be winning the lobbying war. The USFS is like a horse attached to a million sets of reins, being commanded to go in a million different directions. ”Woodsman, spare that tree” even if it has only one green needle, or leaf, on it seems to be the group that is currently winning.
And artiofab, “Ladder fuels are ecologically useful: their decomposition (and even burning) keeps nutrients in the forests” is true, but there is so much excess organic matter in the LNF that is standing dead or half-dead now because of the density of the forest that cleaning some of it out would be a blessing. And all that excess of trees means that no one tree gets enough moisture to drink. Thinning out the small stuff, and the samll and medium stuff that is under the crown of a mature tree, actually helps the remaining trees to become more “juicy” and therefore more resistant to fire. I can’t point you to a specific reference for these thoughts, my opinions on this are formed by conversations with friends who live in rural areas (as I do).
“Please admit you are mistaken and the Republican did not cut the budget since no budget has been passed. Incidentally, the roadblock to having a federal budget is in the Senate where the Democrats have blocked all budgets for three years.”
vs
“I am neither Republican nor Democrat, I am that group moving away from you R and D partisans.”
Dr. Swickard, while you might be non-partisan, quoting a partisan talking point makes you sound partisan. Just a heads-up.
Wait wait wait your sole source of events is what the USFS says they are….No no officer let me tell me you what happened here….I was not speeding and driving carelessly…And I totally did my job as best I could…..This is how it happened…. As for the libertarian hell, heaven forbid we hold our government accountable and make them actually do their jobs, even still no way should fire them for failing, typical liberal hogwash. Hemingway please revisit my first comment I think you and Ms. Wedum are suffering from the same condition…
Sorry a little late now but apologies on the acronymatic use of profanity.
Just sent.
Ahhh I see. That is fair. Can you post it for me or send it to me replace the offending phrase with “hogwash”
If you want to resubmit your comment without that, I’ll be happy to publish it.
T_J, not partisan at all. Check out our comments policy:
http://www.nmpolitics.net/index/policies/
You’ll see a provision in there that forbids cussing, even using acronyms.
Hey Heath why did you moderate my comment out and let the attacks by Hemingway and Eichhorn stand? Kind partisan isnt it?
Mr. Swickard PHD has no understanding of the past Congressional legislation on forest management.
There should be detailed discussion of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act – one of the sponsors was Congressman Pearce. It was Republican legislation for thinning the forests with bipartisan support in 2003. Then Congress inadequately funded this program for years.
http://www.abqjournal.com/opinion/guest_columns/guest05-24-03.htm
https://wiki.umn.edu/pub/ESPM3241W/S09TopicSummaryTeamSeven/roll_call_analysis.pdf
http://www.eenews.net/public/Landletter/2008/11/06/1
It’s called a paraphrase
I guess those quotation marks threw me off
Mr. Swickard is not either a R and D partisan. He is an out and out Tea party believer. As he said in one of his commentary: “All it takes to belong to the TEA Party is to care about what is happening. Obviously there are millions of new people who have decided to care.”
The Tea Party just distorts facts to reflect their their anti-Federal government stance. Their lessons from history are atrocious. We no longer live in the 18th century.
The fires in Lincoln County are personal to me. These are some of my friends who lost homes or almost lost homes. Read what my friend Julie Carter writes about the heartbreaking losses. You partisans sit playing partisan games in the safety and comfort of your homes without having such a disaster put upon you. Go up to Capitan, sit in the Smokey Bear Cafe, talk to the locals. What you will hear will not be the story you get from Washington on full spin control. These people are on the ground and live the forest every day.
Where the fires burned are some of my favorite hiking and camping areas. It does not matter to me if it is good or bad for Republicans or Democrats. But that is where these comments cross the line. If this was a Republican administration I would be drown out by all of you partisans on the Democrat side screaming that the President has dropped the ball. Instead you say nothing because it is a Democratic administration – except you every day bash Steve Pearce because he is a Republican.
It’s personal to me that my government is intimidated by the lawsuits and let this happen rather than fight for what is right for the forest. The Clinton Administration dropped the ball. The Bush Administration dropped the ball. The Obama administration dropped the ball. We have had decades of ball droppers who wouldn’t fight the good fight for our forests. The legislature in Santa Fe has not taken on Washington. Why not?
You are either part of the problem or part of the solution. Making it partisan just continues the dysfunction in Washington. We must change the dialog in New Mexico away from the lawyers in the environmental lobby. They have destroyed the forest, not by the fires, but by the incessant lawsuits and Wilderness initiatives such that we cannot harvest the ladder fuels before they allow catastrophic fires to burn. There is no middle ground. Do what is right for the forests or watch them burn in ways that leave the ground without trees for decades.
Now if anything I say is “not exactly the sort of source that inspires confidence” let me be the first to say that I could not care in the least what you partisans say. I am neither Republican nor Democrat, I am that group moving away from you R and D partisans.
Forests in the American southwest are naturally supposed to periodically burn; we have data backing up that statement, see this for one example of what kinds of conclusions we have been able to reach from this data. This runs counter to what the USFS was trying to do from roughly 1900 to the 1970s, and it runs counter to human concerns; we want fires put out, ASAP, if there’s any risk that they will damage human property. The most parsimonious solution to decreasing human risk from wildfires (keeping housing, commerce, and industry far enough from forests to not be threatened) is not one that can easily be legislated or even suggested, so instead we have to blame someone else for fires going “out of control”.
Honestly, it would be fantastic if people living in communities near forests could clean forests of ladder fuels, and I think that wilderness groups are occasionally throwing the baby out with the bathwater when they do everything in their power to stop this practice, but, as New Mexico’s population grows, it becomes more and more damaging to the forests to let whomever go in and collect what they want. Ladder fuels are ecologically useful: their decomposition (and even burning) keeps nutrients in the forests, ensuring the continued health of the forests. Fires create a temporary blight on the landscape, but they also make sure that forests will be there centuries in the future.
It’s called a paraphrase, stever; as nothing about the substance of the quote was actually changed between, “Friends of mine on the ground heard the people say,” and the truncated paraphrase, “My friends heard people say,” then it is not technically a “misquote”. It is still hearsay posing as authority.
“My friends heard people say,” is not exactly the sort of source that inspires confidence.
Nice misquote
Dr. Swickard:
“My friends heard people say,” is not exactly the sort of source that inspires confidence.
What my friends around the forests say to me is that every time there is an attempt to clean the forests of the ladder fuels, an environmental group files another lawsuit and another judge says they cannot do so. For several years I cut firewood in the Capitan Mountains. All we cut was dead trees. My last year of high school cutting firewood was how I got the money to go to college. Why is that a problem to get the fuel load out of the forest? The inability to reduce fuel loads because of judicial action is what the fire chief said on the video posted in my column a few weeks ago. And, again, this is what many of my friends in Lincoln County say.
Yes, I was nit-picking a bit with the notion that there has not been a budget for three years. Steve Pearce is correct that this was mismanagement to not throw everything at the fire in the three days before it jumped into a wildfire. This same thing happened in the Gila where it could have been put out, but was not. Friends of mine on the ground heard the people say to let it burn including someone at the Alamogordo airport who was talking with the pilots. Pearce did get the head of the Forest Service to admit the policy is to let it burn when lightning strikes. He did say that.
To be sure the real criminal in all of these wildfires are the judges who rule for the Wildlife groups who want no cutting in the National Forests and in the Wilderness. Sadly, those are the areas that are now completely barren after the fires. It will be many decades before the trees return. It now looks like Wilderness on the Moon.
There has not been a federal budget passed in three years
Dr. Swickard is probably aware that this is nit-picking and/or not actually true, but in case he is not, and for those in the audience who are unaware on how it is, please enjoy that link, as well as this one, as well as this one if you have the time to parse through a longer document.
FWIW, one can look at the FY2012 budget for the USDA, and look at the budget for the USFS (p. 77) and notice that they estimated less moneys in FY2012 than in FY2011, with a large chunk of that decrease ($302M) in wildland fire activities, including $96M less in “Hazardous Fuels Reduction”. Can anyone get some numbers on whether their funding did or did not decrease?
“Facts”: def: Conservative term meaning “things we chose to believe”.
Dr. Swickard:
Why should Ms. Wedum “correct” accurate statements when you consistently fail to correct inaccurate ones? For starters, no where do I see Ms. Wedum blaming this or any other fire on Republicans; she is instead objecting to the words of a specific Republican (Congressman Pearce) attacking people whose efforts he has personally crippled.
Secondly, claiming that Congressional Democrats are solely responsible for blocking three years of budgets is disingenuous at best; indeed, it crosses the border into outright falsehood, since it was actually Congressional Republicans who blocked the budget for the first two years. More importantly, some of those Republicans openly admitted that they were doing it for electoral reasons rather than ideological ones. Since then, yes, the Democratic Party has been blocking Republican budget measures, but since those budgets are being written with the full knowledge that the Democratic Party can never support their rampantly anti-education, anti-environmental, anti-worker, anti-woman, anti-poor, anti-middle class, and frankly anti-Twentieth Century measures, to blame the lack of a budget solely on the Democratic Party is rather like blaming the sinking of the Titanic solely on the iceberg; it doesn’t change the fact that the ship was poorly-constructed.
Finally, if you are going to harp on semantics, I have to either assume that either you have chosen to speak with authority on things that you have made no effort to understand, or you have chosen to actively ignore the existence of appropriations bills and continuing resolutions. While neither option speaks particularly favorably of you, I am confident in assuming that you are not lacking in intellect – particularly when you have already been publicly corrected about your selective and misleading statements regarding fire management and Federal budgeting of the Forest Service – and instead have made the active choice in an attempt to either make yourself feel better about Congressman Pearce’s lack of moral fortitude or merely to score cheap political points rather than offering legitimate solutions to a demonstrable and demonstrated issue that affects your fellow citizens.
It clear that you are the blind partisan rather than Ms. Wedum if you are demanding that verifiable fact be replaced by your unsubstantiated opinion.
Otis, the helicopters dropped the water from a height of 200-300 feet, I assumed they were flying as close to the tops of the trees as they could. Probably not a good assumption.
Ellen Wedum wrote: “If Congressman Pearce thinks that the U.S. Forest Service should be able to respond to fires faster than on foot, he and his fellow Republicans should stop cutting the Forest Service budget.”
Ellen, What budget did the Republicans cut? There has not been a federal budget passed in three years. Please admit you are mistaken and the Republican did not cut the budget since no budget has been passed. Incidentally, the roadblock to having a federal budget is in the Senate where the Democrats have blocked all budgets for three years.
Because you, Ellen Wedum, are a partisan, you want to make the problem in Ruidoso the fault of the Republicans. You are wrong. This column needs to be corrected to reflect the facts.
Since 2010, Congressman Pearce and his Republican colleagues have cut the federal firefighting budget by more than $200 million. The current fleet of big air tankers which drop fire retardant date to the 1950′s. The number of large aircraft has steadily dwindled since 2004, when the Forest Service grounded 33 air tankers after a number of high-profile crashes. There were 43 tankers a decade ago; now there are only 17. In addition, since the Republican plan cuts the firefighting fund, the US has been forced to request the assistance of Canada to help extinguish the wildfires. The anti-Federal government strategy of the Republicans and Congressman Pearce is to discredit the US Forest Service. However this political game jeopardizes American lives and property.
+1 T_J_Fed1897
Congressman Steve “Mr. Forest Ranger” Pearce deserves all the criticism and more. On KVIA contemptible Mr. Pearce actually lied and said that the US Forest Service Chief thought the New Mexico wildfires were “useful”. In other words the wildfires were good. This kind of irresponsible talk is despicable.
This is typical anti-federal government political rhetoric. In addition Mr. Pearce has no knowledge of the pine beetles and wildfires.
Welcome to Libertarian Hell. Cut taxes and cut taxes and then not have enough resources to respond to an emergency. Soon we will not have enough resources to manage daily affairs. The same has happened to infrastructure. The same has happened to education. All this so we can more tax cuts for the rich.
T_J, check out the log (as I did). http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5376097.pdf
This is the real story, not “revision history.”
You need to proofread this article. Three-hundred foot trees?
Ugggh …. ummmm…..hmmm not sure she gets it. Neat little story from her perspective but this is purely anecdotal and seems to be an entirely partisan attempt at revision history for the sake of attacking Mr. Pearce