Three Common Myths About Wildfires. The More You Know …
Three newsletters in three days. We’re on 🔥
If you’re new to Burning Questions, check out our first newsletter here.
This is the latest edition — the third in three days to come out of a current Colorado College journalism class “Reporting on Wildfires,” which wraps up next week.
In today’s installment we have some information about wildfire myths, updates on the work nonprofits are doing to help educate the youth on wildfires, wildfire tourism, and the furry friends that can help prevent wildfire.
This edition was written and reported by Colorado College “Reporting on Wildfire” students Ayden Cherry, Anna Wooster, Vivian Zander, and Henry Hodde.
🤯 Now, Onto Those Myths…
On a recent Tuesday in a hangar at the Centennial Airport outside of Denver, a half dozen individuals who work in wildfire aviation spoke to a class of Colorado College students about their work using aircraft to battle wildfires in the West.
The group ranged from former hotshots, to experts in firefighting airplanes and helicopters, and even included some with backgrounds in fire science. Multiple experts mentioned the importance of wildfire education and highlighted what they felt might be some common misunderstandings among the general public about their field.
In no particular order, here are three common myths they touched on that we felt we could help clear up.
Fire Retardant Doesn’t Extinguish Fire
One thing some in the group mentioned as a potential gap in general fire public knowledge was what fire retardant actually accomplishes while fighting a blaze.
TV news might show images or videos of aircraft spraying a red mist or dirt-like substance over a fire. This is fire retardant, and, contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t “put out” fires.
In the 2017 book Megafire, journalist and author Michael Kodas noted that some firefighters referred to these heroic-looking retardant runs as “CNN drops.” In an interview with Kodas, environmental ethicist Andy Stahl says, “if retardant weren’t red, it wouldn’t be used anymore.”
In another interview with Kodas, a former deputy director of fire and aviation for the forest service, George Weldon, argues that the effectiveness of fire retardant is neither proven nor backed by science.
According to Megafire, a 2014 study found that in 2010 and 2011 in all wildfires where aircraft dropped retardant during the initial attack, 75% of these fires still escaped containment.
Retardant is also costly. According to hotshot veteran and fire science expert Jesse Moreng, one drop of retardant is roughly “$20,000.”
So does retardant do anything at all? Fire retardant can slow the progress of a rapidly spreading fire, some firefighters we spoke to said.
When meeting with the crew at Centennial Airport, some of the firefighters said that if they were on the ground fighting a fire they would want to be backed by a line of retardant. According to them, a line of retardant can help buy time in making decisions for fighting the fire, and helps firefighters reach better places to attack.
This, however, is different from actually putting out the fire itself.
According to Moreng, firefighters often hear people saying they want aircraft to drop retardant on homes engulfed in flames. That would just be a waste of money, he said. The retardant won’t be able to help if a structure is already burning.
Aircraft Don’t ‘Put Out’ Wildfires
There’s also confusion about an aircraft’s role in fighting fires, the group of firefighters said.
When a big fire breaks out, it’s common for TV crews to broadcast images of planes swooping overhead dropping streaks of red fire retardant, or helicopters blasting blazes with gallons of water. But that doesn’t actually put out the fire. Instead, according to the fire team at Centennial Airport, these aerial efforts are meant to weaken a fire so the firefighters on the ground can fight it themselves.
“Aircraft do not put out fires,” said Bruce Dikken, an aviation expert.
“Fires are put out by guys in leather boots and shovels,” said Moreng. “Everything else is there to support them.”
While these planes might appear flashy and heroic on TV screens, the real people who combat the fires are the individuals on the ground using axes, shovels, and other tools.
According to the team at Centennial Airport, some fire aircraft may only help provide firefighters with the information they need to fight fires. Multi-Mission Aircraft (MMA planes), for instance, provide details about the strength of a fire, where a fire might be moving, and help map a perimeter of a fire. This is all information essential to fighting fire. A firefighter may need this information but might not be able to attain it for themselves on the ground.
One expert explained that these MMA planes have an infrared camera that can locate small spot fires and even contained campfires from up to 30 miles away. These high-powered cameras can stream what the aircraft is seeing from above to the people fighting the fire on the ground below. What the MMA planes don’t have, however, is water or retardant. But they still play an important role.
Fire Is Not All Bad
The last gap in knowledge that the firefighters mentioned was the idea that all fire is bad.
In 1910, the U.S. Forest Service declared war on fire. They sought to put out every fire that cropped up and deemed fire the enemy, using campaigns like Smokey the Bear to win public support for the war waged on fire.
While fire has the potential to be destructive, not all fire is bad. In fact, fire is a natural part of the forest ecosystem.
According to researchers at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, fire can have many positive effects on the ecosystem. Some of these include: The removal of invasive species from forests, forest thinning, and the addition of beneficial plant nutrients from leftover ash.
On top of this, there are some trees that require fire to reproduce. Lodgepole pines, for instance, have serotinous cones that hold their seeds. These cones require direct heat in order to open and reproduce. Often, this heat comes from naturally occurring wildfires.
Not only can fire be beneficial for the ecology of a forest, but it can also help with future fire mitigation. According to Dikken, U.S. forests are often overgrown. This overgrowth creates an abundance of fuel for future fires.
Naturally occurring low-severity fires that burn through overgrowth, thin the forest and lessen the potential fuel for future fires.
With this in mind, one method of fire mitigation is prescribed burning. A prescribed burn is when firefighters ignite a section of forest in a designated area. They will let this fire burn away the excess fuel, lessening the potential for devastating fires in the area.
Indigenous groups have used prescribed burns for hundreds of years, understanding the benefits of such fires. The U.S. Forest Service thwarted these “good fires” when the government agency began its war on fire in the early 20th century.
Firefighters also practice mitigation by manually removing overgrowth by hand. However, according to the fire team at Centennial Airport, hand removal can only accomplish a fraction of what a prescribed burn can do. They pointed out that to do all of the necessary thinning by hand would take far more resources and people than are available.
Of course, fire can cause destruction, but fire that burns away from structure might benefit the ecology of a forest and also can help mitigate the risk for future fire. — Ayden Cherry
Catching Fire: Wildfire Tourism
To visit or not to visit post-wildfire is an ongoing debate, particularly when conflicting information emerges.
Recent conversations about the ethics of tourism have surged during the current fire season. Controversies in Hawaii have thrust the national spotlight on traditional tourist towns, but this debate might not be new to plenty of Coloradans. For some of the idyllic tourist towns that line Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, and their residents, the correct answer is complicated. Wildfires make the situation even more elaborate.
Often, the wildfires that rip through the West are devastating to local tourism economies. Here are three key scenarios where wildfires have a direct impact on economic growth:
Wildfires are often followed by aggressive tourism campaigns. Local economies need stimulation after the immediate event has passed. In California, the 2018 fire season led to an 11% decrease in the projected tourism economy over one month. That's effectively $20 million up in flames.
Hotels often price gouge right after fires. Think Taylor Swift Ticketmaster saga but during a natural disaster. Often there is a massive housing and hospitality surge that can impact the market for weeks.
Wildfire tourism may begin to emerge: This phenomenon happens when people market disasters. You can read more about that here.
We looked further into one specific tourism economy that has bounced back in recent years. Located about 100 miles outside of Denver is the town of Grand Lake. Grand Lake’s town center was spared by 2020’s East Troublesome Fire, but many residents and homeowners were not as fortunate. A central aspect of Grand Lake is its tourism base, but its campaign to re-engage tourists has sometimes become muddled with complicated realities.
Henry Hodde, one of this newsletter’s authors, had the opportunity last summer to interview Grand Lake resident Emily Hagen about the complicated nature of revitalizing the town post-fire. “We're going to have people that show up here that don't know what happened,” Hagen said, adding that the town likely has more people showing up “because they want to see what happened.” (🙋♀️ Burning Questions is guilty as charged. We traveled to Grand Lake this week for a field trip to speak with others affected by the fire and those who helped fight it.)
One predicament the town faces is a potential vast disparity among those who know about the fire and those who don’t prior to visiting Grand Lake.
Controlling the narrative and level of intrusion into “what happened” is where the idea for Troublesome Stories, a public exhibit in Grand Lake, originated.
Hagen grappled with the idea that tourists want to “drive by burned down houses,” she said, adding that some of them “want to witness other people's loss.” She channeled this — the duality of knowing that Grand Lake needs tourists, but also not wanting to exploit or monetize the destruction — into a collection of personal stories, artifacts, and images.
“Our intent is to provide a glimpse into our community’s loss in a respectful and dignified way in order to educate guests on the human element of a wildfire as well as push the importance behind fire prevention, especially as a guest in a mountain destination” the Troublesome Stories website touts.
For Hagen, the conversation circled back to having input on how tourists interacted with Grand Lake.
“The whole purpose was to put a lens of compassion on these visitors as they were learning what our community had literally just gone through so that they weren't going out and driving through neighborhoods,” she said.
Creating a specific place where people could learn about the fire provided — locals who wanted to participate, that is — with a space where they could share their stories. It satisfied both the tourists and the town.
Plenty of communities have had to find a balance between well-meaning visitors with little knowledge of the recent devastating fires and entrepreneurs who want to use the fire for economic gain or disaster tourists who want to intrude. After all, there is an industry post-fire, and sometimes that economy emerges from the ashes and destruction directly. — Anna Wooster
Goats, Beavers, Owls, Woodpeckers: These Animals Prevent, Mitigate, and Live for Wildfire
When you think of wildfire-prevention tactics, what is your first thought?
Your mind might not immediately go to beavers and goats, but they play an important role.
🐐 A goat's diet typically consists of roughage and they are drawn to landscapes consisting of the woody parts of plants that many other animals do not eat. If given a chance, they often prefer to eat through hay, grasses, and other weeds. Conveniently, much of the Western United States is overgrown with just that.
Over the years, goat grazing as a form of wildfire mitigation has become more popular, with both the federal Bureau of Land Management and private homeowners “hiring” goats to clear up their properties. The goats’ hours of hard work help reduce fuels for wildfires and create fire breaks, making it harder for fires to spread, and in return they’re rewarded with a hearty meal.
🦫 According to National Geographic, a beaver’s main purpose is to construct a habitat well equipped for a colony of beavers. They are constantly working to chew down trees, burrow into river banks, and build dams to block streams, creating large pond oases. Their lodges provide shelter for themselves and other small animals like muskrats and otters. Their habitats allow beetles and other aquatic life to prosper and offer great protection for those populations. Beyond that, the irrigation canals formed within their habitat allows collected water to nurture plants and establish deep roots within the soil.
These habitats are able to withstand the heat of wildfires, leaving the wetlands green and healthy after a fire. Irrigation tunnels that spread throughout the land double as a fireproofing method, sometimes even capable of halting a fire.
California-based ecohydrologist Emily Fairfax, and Andrew Whittle, a Colorado-based geological engineer, conducted a study in 2020 determined to find evidence backing the claim that beavers reduce the impacts of wildland fires. In comparing affected sites before, during, and after fires, satellite photos they collected showcased a lush, green environment on land within beaver habitats, burning up to three times less than areas elsewhere.
After a destructive wildfire, few can survive, but birds are consistently among the first species to return to these burned landscapes.
🦉 Spotted owls, who have been around for thousands of years, have adapted to contend with more fire in their habitat. When fires ignite, owls use their sharp eyesight to hunt small rodents that are trying to flee the forest before escaping themselves. Upon their return, owls like to hunt in severely burned patches of forest that provide habitat for small mammals that might have survived the fire.
Beyond foraging, these habitats encourage higher reproduction and recruitment, growing populations, and quicker return in severe burned areas. However, if there is no nesting in charred areas, scientists use that as an indicator that a fire was exceptionally severe, which helps them determine the more recent changes in landscapes.
🐦⬛ Black-backed woodpeckers have been known to be the first to take advantage of recently burned forests. Their main diet consists of wood-boring beetles, which become abundant post fire. They live within forests of spruces and prefer to nest in dead trees in pyrodiverse landscapes, areas where wildfire results in patches of high, medium, and low intensity burns. Although they typically reside within high intensity landscapes, they also seek low intensity regions as they provide more protection for their young.
Woodpeckers have even been known to guide forest managers on their post-fire planning due to their sensitivity to deforestation. One study published in Ecological Applications led by Andrew Stillman looked into woodpecker behavior to determine how to manage biodiversity conservation post-wildfires “as a case study to demonstrate a pathway for incorporating pyrodiversity into wildlife habitat assessments for adaptive management.”
Despite the major habitat loss post-wildfire, these animals continue to support affected regions, ultimately helping to speed up landscape regrowth and recovery. — Vivian Zander
(💡Fun fact: After woodpeckers abandon their nests and move on, other species — take the chipmunk for example — make these holes their new home and with their habits disperse pine cone seeds to other areas.)
📖 The Kids are Wildfire Prepared
When it comes to wildfire mitigation, there’s a role for everyone.
Last weekend, the Boulder Daily Camera newspaper published a story about a program that connects teenagers with local homeowners, helping to make homes more wildfire safe. This isn’t the only program for young Coloradans to get involved in wildfire mitigation in their own community.
Katya Schloesser has designed a program on natural hazards resilience called HEART Force.
“I work with rural teachers all over, in all four corners of Colorado,” Schloesser tells Burning Questions. “The main goal of the project is to increase middle and high school students and teachers’ knowledge of wildfire, flood, and drought, and then empower those students to take action to increase their community’s resilience to those hazards.”
The program has three parts:
First, there are some natural hazards lessons. Students learn about disaster terminology, and how to read data sets that those responding to natural disasters use. For example, students might use the Colorado State Forest Service’s wildfire risk map to understand the risk for the school’s community. Lastly, students zero in on climate change, and the way it changes the landscape.
Part two is centered around a scenario based role playing game. “It's like a board game, but students work in teams and they have to address the hazard as it's occurring in their own communities,” says Schloesser. She and her team make maps of the communities, and then students are asked to respond with the resources they are given.
Then comes a design challenge. Students use what they’ve learned to increase resilience in their own community. For this part of the curriculum, they work with members of their own town that are external to the school.
Schloesser says the program really aims to facilitate community based learning.
“One of the main goals of the program is also to bring in the local emergency manager or the floodplain manager or folks within the community, maybe a farmer or rancher, to talk about what struggles they've had,” Schloesser says.
She adds that one of the primary benefits of teaching in rural communities is that the students often already know these people.
“It might be somebody's parents or aunt or uncle or somebody that they've seen at the grocery store,” she says. “So it’s a different flavor of education where students really get to be agents of change within their community.”
Asked why she designed the program for middle and high schoolers specifically, she said:
Looking longer term, Schloesser is hopeful that youth community members will have an active voice in planning for hazards in conjunction with response teams. The next time an emergency manager is revising their town’s hazard mitigation plan, she’d love it if they would call up the school’s teachers and ask what the students think.
It might be easy to get depressed and bogged down by all of the news about wildfire and climate change in general.
I, for one, certainly feel that anxiety often. But Schloesser says that the program has really helped young citizens to make a difference, combatting all of the negativity.
“I think that's a really nice thing about this program,” she says. “It's a way to feel like you're doing something, and really focusing on a community level impact.”
That is what she finds the most rewarding. — Henry Hodde
You’re reading Burning Questions, a newsletter that seeks to help bridge a gap between wildfire science research and journalism, and is a project of the Colorado College Journalism Institute with support from a National Science Foundation grant. Students produced this edition in their class “Reporting on Wildfires” in the fall of 2023. Learn more about this newsletter here. 📬 Enter your email address to subscribe and get Burning Questions delivered to your inbox each time it comes out. You can reach us with questions, feedback, or tips by emailing burningquestionscc@gmail.com