Author

Mount Rushmore drafts plan for Mountain Pine Beetle

Bill GabbertMarch 1, 2010December 17, 2019Uncategorizedbeetles, Mount Rushmore, Photo by Bill G, prescribed fire2 Comments

Mount Rushmore looking down from the top — Mount Rushmore administrative site, looking down from just below the sculpture . Photo by Bill Gabbert

Mount Rushmore National Memorial has posted a draft plan on how they intend to manage the mountain pine beetle (MPB) epidemic that is headed their way. The problem is real, with the beetles staged just outside the memorial’s boundary on U.S. Forest Service land. While the critters are native to South Dakota and much of the western US, if they wipe out most of the Ponderosa pines near the sculpture in a epidemic caused by years of drought, it will not be a very pleasing sight for the 2.5 million visitors that trek there every year.

The plan calls for thinning most of the 1,200-acre site, spraying some areas, and treating much of the site with prescribed fire. They are asking for $5,653,150 through FY 2014. That works out to $4,710 per acre. Here is a summary of their treatment recommendations.

Spraying high value trees with insecticide to prevent loss within the developed area
Search, mark, and remove infested trees throughout the Memorial
Thin forests along the Highway 244 corridor to create a fuel and bug break
Thin forests throughout the Memorial to varying density and age class levels
Thin a 300 foot MPB and fire break along the south, west, and east boundary of the Memorial
Introduce prescribed fire throughout the Memorial after thinning
Communicate MPB management issues to the public

The memorial has enough funding to begin implementing the plan if it is approved, but they will be asking for more dollars to work on the list above, plus hiring four employees, including interpreters and a public information officer.

LA County FD Task force stages for mobilization to Chile

Bill GabbertMarch 1, 2010March 1, 2010Uncategorized

Information from the Los Angeles County Fire Department at 11 pm PT today:

UPDATE at 2:34 pm PT, March 1

LA County sent us a corrected new release, clarifying that the Task Force is only staged for deployment. The updated news release is below:

==============

LOS ANGELES – March 1, 2010 – California Task Force 2 (CA-TF2), Los Angeles County Fire’s world-class Heavy Rescue Task Force, is staged for possible deployment to Chile to help rescue and recover earthquake victims in Latin America, following a 8.8 magnitude earthquake off the coast of Maule, Chile.

Commanders of the 74-member team received the request from the U.S. Agency for International Development Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (USAID-OFDA), and are currently staging at the Department’s USAR Facility in Pacoima. The team includes two additional search team managers, three physicians, three structural specialists, and six rescue canines.

California Task Force 2 (CA-TF2) is a specially-trained and equipped Urban Search and Rescue Task Force consisting of Los Angeles County Fire Department firefighters and paramedics rescue specialists, emergency room physicians, structural engineers, heavy equipment specialists, canine search dogs and handlers, hazardous materials technicians, communications specialists, and logistics specialists. This unique technical rescue team responds with 70,000 pounds of prepackaged search and rescue tools and medical equipment to conduct around-the-clock search and rescue operations at domestic and international disasters, both natural and man-made.

The rush of battle

Bill GabbertMarch 1, 2010December 26, 2010Uncategorizedsafety4 Comments

“The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug.” Chris Hedges

The movie The Hurt Locker, opens with that quote on the screen. I saw it yesterday, an excellent movie about a U.S. Army bomb squad, or Emergency Ordinance Disposal team, working in Baghdad, Iraq in 2004. It is a very gripping movie that as Kenneth Turan, a film critic for the LA Times said, “it simply blows you apart and doesn’t bother putting you back together again”. The movie has been nominated for nine academy awards.

The interactions between the individuals in the bomb squad, and the tense drama as improvised explosive devices are being disarmed, are fascinating. The leader of the unit, Sergeant First Class William James, is a risk taker, a reckless cowboy sometimes putting not only himself but the rest of the unit and innocent bystanders in peril.

After Sgt. James put out a vehicle fire with a 20-pound dry chemical fire extinguisher, and then disarmed a huge bomb in the car’s trunk, an officer called him repeatedly a “Wild Man, a Wild Man”. At first I was not sure if that was a compliment, but the officer thought it was. He was proud of the Sergeant, while the rest of his unit had been advising him to abandon the rigged car, since everyone had been evacuated from the area and it was much too hazardous to attempt to disarm the bomb in the still-smoking car which could have been detonated at any time by an insurgent with a cell phone.

You may know someone like this in the firefighting profession.

But I hope you don’t.

I don’t know that I would go so far as to say that firefighting is a “potent and lethal addiction”, or is a “drug”, but a person could draw some parallels between warfighting and firefighting. Well, on second thought, it might be a potent addiction, while being occasionally lethal, unfortunately.

Vote for the Wildland Firefighter Foundation

Bill GabbertFebruary 28, 2010August 25, 2019UncategorizedWildland Firefighter Foundation4 Comments

NASCAR is sponsoring a contest in which you can design a paint scheme on one of their drivers’ cars, then anyone can vote once a day on their favorite design. The winning paint scheme will actually get painted onto a car and will help pace the field at the 2010 NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race on May 22.

Tom Stein and his wife, of Boise, Idaho, designed this car to benefit the Wildland Firefighter Foundation which assists the families of fallen and injured wildland firefighters. Tom’s father was an air tanker pilot at Hemet-Ryan air tanker base in southern California and Tom has been a big supporter of the WFF.

If this car wins it will result in a lot of recognition for the WFF and could help support the families of our fallen and injured firefighters.

VOTE once a day for the car.

Good clearance saved homes from Florida wildfire

Bill GabbertFebruary 26, 2010Uncategorized2 Comments

Firefighters are saying that good clearance around homes kept many of them from being damaged in a 200-acre wildfire near Naples, Florida.

Free fire protection

Bill GabbertFebruary 26, 2010August 25, 2019Uncategorized

While the Washington state senate has passed legislation requiring firefighters to take suppression action on fires even if they are outside their fire protection district, the city of Boise, Idaho is trying to collect $15,146 from a resident after firefighters fought a fire outside their city limits.