TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/082790/0827106.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 6.4 KB | 138 lines

                                                                                NATION, Page 38

Fire at El Capitan


A horrific blaze at Yosemite reignites a heated debate: Should
forest fires be extinguished or allowed to burn themselves out?

By MICHAEL D. LEMONICK -- Reported by Andrea Dorfman/New York
and Dennis Wyss/San Francisco


    Flames danced from treetop to treetop, and a thick pall of
acrid smoke descended on the valley. The majestic stands of
giant sequoias were difficult to make out, and the monolithic
granite landmarks -- El Capitan, Sentinel Rock and Half Dome
-- were all but invisible.  Perhaps the most beautiful and
certainly among the most popular of national parks,
California's Yosemite was shrouded in gloom last week as three
major wildfires, triggered by lightning strikes the week
before, swept through the pristine forest. Residents of nearby
towns fled their homes, and for the first time in its 100-year
history, Yosemite was closed. Some 10,000 visitors trapped
overnight in the park's central valley were finally led out at
4:30 the next morning along roads flanked by blazing trees. The
scene brought back frightening memories of 1988, when nearly
half of Yellowstone National Park was engulfed in flame.

    This time, though, man was able to beat back the fiery force
of nature. Ten days after the conflagrations started, a corps
of more than 15,000 fire fighters finally had them largely
contained, and officials began to let visitors back into
sections of the park. But the damage done was severe: some
24,000 acres of forest were gone. The town of Foresta, which
lies within the park, lost 66 of its 86 buildings, and ranches
on Yosemite's edges were charred.

    The park's wildfires were only one patch in a mosaic of
destruction all across the Far West. In California, Oregon,
Washington, Idaho and Montana, 195,000 acres were still aflame
at the end of the week, and in the vast wilderness of Alaska
another 2 million acres were burning. Now in its fourth
consecutive year of drought, the western edge of the nation is
one big tinderbox, and a single spark is enough to kindle an
inferno. So far this year, 10 fire fighters have died, 740
homes and other buildings have been destroyed, thousands more
have been threatened, and property damage has run into the
millions of dollars. In all, more than 3.6 million acres of
forest have been turned to stumps and ashes. Even if this fire
season ended today, it would be twice as bad as last year's,
and the second worst since 1983.

    As homeowners confront the blackened remains of their
belongings and Americans wonder if the parks will survive long
enough to be seen by their children, an old question arises
anew: Is enough being done to prevent fires and to stop them
once they start? The issue flared two years ago in the wake of
the Yellowstone fires. That disaster was blamed on the National
Park Service's decade-old policy of letting some fires burn
unhindered.

    The idea behind "let-it-burn" is reasonable enough. Fire has
always been especially prevalent in the West, and over
thousands of years the forests have adapted. Some trees, like
giant sequoias, have evolved a thick, flame-resistant bark. The
sequoias and others actually depend on fire to make their cones
pop open, spreading seeds for the next generation of growth.
Periodic blazes clear underbrush and let in sunlight to nourish
the seedlings.

    If the underbrush is left to accumulate too long, a small
fire can turn into a catastrophe. "We used to have a Smokey
Bear philosophy that all fire is bad," says Park Service
spokesman Dwayne Collier. "Now we accept that it has a natural
and useful role." Environmentalists agree. "There's really no
controversy here," says Steve Whitney, director of the national
parks program at the Wilderness Society.

    Accordingly, the Park Service reversed its long-standing
policy in the late 1970s. Natural blazes that did not threaten
people or property were allowed to take their course, and park
officials would sometimes start fires intentionally. But the
term let-it-burn is a misnomer, says Elmer Hurd, head of the
service's fire-management branch. "We don't ignore fires," he
says. "We continually monitor them." In Yellowstone, rangers
finally stepped in when the flames got out of hand, but it was
too late. By the time autumn rains finally quenched the fires,
some 1 million acres had gone up in smoke. It was a public
relations fiasco, and the Park Service moved quickly to review
its procedures. In the end, though, while some details were
changed, the overall policy remained the same. The reason the
Yosemite fires were attacked quickly and effectively is that
they started in areas near towns and thus had to be put out
immediately. Says Hurd: "There was no question about what we
would do."

    The Yosemite episode seems to vindicate the Park Service's
strategy -- and at the same time makes it clear that the old
suppress-all-fires system caused more problems than it solved.
Last week's blazes spread quickly not only because of drought
but also because decades' worth of excess brush had accumulated
during the years before controlled burning began.

    The manpower and equipment for fighting the Yosemite
wildfires came largely from the Boise Interagency Fire Center,
in Idaho, which dispatches fire fighters across the country and
coordinates their efforts. More than 23,000 have been mobilized
this summer, including 2,000 U.S. Army troops. "Right now we've
nearly reached our ceiling," says information officer Reed
Jarvis. "If we had any greater demands, we would be sorely
stressed." More troops could be called up within days, but that
might not be fast enough in case of a major blaze.

    Thanks to higher humidity, cooler temperatures and
diminishing winds, the flames have begun to die down in every
state except Alaska. But while weather will always be the
dominant factor in starting and sustaining fires, the amount
of damage they cause depends on the choices individuals make.
Fire fighters are becoming increasingly concerned about places
like Santa Barbara, Calif., where residential areas are
encroaching on wilderness. Fires are as much a part of the
Western environment as hurricanes are on the barrier islands of
the East and Gulf coasts. And people who choose to live in such
places are automatically putting their lives and possessions
at risk.