A bill by State Senator Al Davis of Hyannis requiring the state to do more to fight and prevent wildfires in the most remote corners of the state is scheduled for a hearing this Friday before the legislature’s Natural Resources Committee.
LB-634…the Wildfire Control Act of 2013…requires the Nebraska Forest Service to contract with private companies to station single-engine air tankers near Chadron and Valentine for firefighting.
The agency would also have to thin state forests to reduce the wildfire risk, expand its training programs for residents and volunteer firefighters, and create an incident-management team that would help respond to future wildfires.
The bill, which has 8 co-sponsors, is part of a rethinking of the state’s approach to wildfires in the wake of last summer’s massive blazes that threatened property, strained local budgets and disrupted businesses that rely on tourism. It comes as forestry officials warn that Nebraska may face massive wildfires on a regular basis in the future.
State Forester and Nebraska Forest Service director Scott Josiah says the state will likely see larger and more intense “mega fires” in coming years for a variety of reasons. Heat, drought and climate change play a role, he says, but so does the spread of eastern red cedar trees – a pine with needles and resin that are both highly flammable.
Josiah says the recent fires are “just so much bigger than what we’ve faced before” and represent “a new normal.” As a result, he says fire departments will need more equipment and resources.
Federal forestry officials in northwest Nebraska are also increasingly concerned that they’ll see a repeat of the fires that scorched thousands of acres of pastureland and wooded areas.
Nebraska National Forests and Grasslands Supervisor Jane Darnell says the persistent drought is a threat in two ways…drying out fuels and preventing cattle from grazing, which helps thin the vegetation. “We haven’t had a big snow season this year,” she says, “so we’re going to be dependent on spring moisture.”
Last year, emergency responders relied on a single-engine plane based in Hot Springs for quick responses while larger tankers flew in from elsewhere.
The single-engine planes carry between 600 and 800 gallons of flame retardant, water or foam, not enough to extinguish a large blaze but able to knock out ones fires in hard-to-reach areas, such as canyons or thick forests, and to soak grass quickly to slow down flames and even keep them from advancing.
Valentine Rural Fire Chief Terry Engles says his department struggled all summer with fires that dipped into canyons in the Sandhills that were too treacherous for ground crews, forcing crews to wait for the growing fires to eventually emerge into more open areas.
Engles says the rugged terrain and valleys in the Sandhills also delayed ground-crew response times, which allowed the fires to spread…adding that a small tanker stationed at Valentine could get to fires in 10 minutes that it might take ground crews an hour to reach.
Nebraska National Forests and Grasslands fire-management officer Brian Daunt says many fires last year burned extremely hot because of the amount of fuel on the ground. He says the small tankers “can definitely buy time to get ground forces in, and save property that we might not otherwise have been able to.”
That’s why the Forest Service has given the Chadron airport a grant to cover the cost of a mixing system for retardant and pumps to fill a small tanker. The Hot Springs-based plane used the Chadron airport several times last year under a mutual aid agreement.
Supporters of the Davis bill argue that stationing such planes full-time in Valentine and Chadron during the fire season would allow them to respond more quickly to protect lives and property while reducing the need for Nebraska to competed with other states for the larger planes.
Davis, who represents much of the Sandhills as well as Dawes, Sheridan, and eastern Box Butte counties, says last summer’s fires “just got out of control so quickly,” explaining that it was very dry, hot and windy, and…took a long time to get in the big tankers that played the big role in containing most of the fires.
He thinks the state probably needs “need to be a little more aggressive with that in the future,” and feels the price tag on his bill is reasonable…about $1.7 million for the air tankers, volunteer training and surplus firefighting equipment called for in his bill.
Nebraska experienced 1,570 wildfires last year that burned a total of 786 square miles – an expanse nearly seven times the size of Omaha, according to the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency.
NEMA spokeswoman Jodie Fawl said 98% of the wildfires were caused by lightning strikes, while the combined cost of ground-level firefighting, aerial suppression and mutual aid from other states cost Nebraska more than $11 million.
Many local departments had to dip into their cash reserves as they raced from one wildfire to another, causing their fuel and equipment-maintenance costs to soar…and not just in northwest Nebraska.
Firefighters in Thedford in the Sandhills spent an estimated $10,000 on fuel alone, compared to $1,500 in a typical summer, and responded to about 40 fire calls when they normally receive eight or 10. Local crews in Brown County blew through their $155,000 annual firefighting budget.
Davis says the fires also took an economic toll on Nebraska that isn’t measured as easily, pointing out that volunteer firefighters hold regular jobs or own businesses, and some were forced to leave their work unattended for more than a week.
Canoeing businesses along the Niobrara River in northern Nebraska were forced to close as flames roared through the river valley, and tourism at Lake McConaughy dropped because of several nearby fires.