News and opinion about wildland fire
The March winds were blowing almost like a Santa Ana in Wind Cave National Park Sunday afternoon. When I was taking these photos I had to brace myself by leaning against something or by getting down on one knee to minimize camera movement. At one point the wind drove a few little hard kernels of snow, “corn snow” into the crevices of my coat and the camera, but that only lasted for a few seconds.
Very strong winds pushed the East Argyle Fire across 107 acres of private land in the Black Hills of South Dakota on Monday. At one weather station in the area a wind gust of 55 mph was measured, challenging firefighters from state, federal, and local fire departments. The fire, which is south of Pringle, SD (map) was reported at 1:34 p.m. on Monday. Thanks to decreasing winds and temperatures reaching down to about 12° during the night, it was contained by mid-morning on Tuesday.
These photos were taken by Bill Gabbert at approximately 4 p.m. MT, March 5, 2013.
A bill has been introduced in the Nebraska Senate that would enhance wildfire training, preparedness, and suppression capability of firefighters in the State. The proposed legislation would provide two single air tankers in the northwest part of the state and develop a Type 3 incident management team, in addition to other provisions. Senator Al Davis of Hyannis will present the bill, called the Wildfire Control Act of 2013, to the Legislature’s Natural Resources Committee on Friday.
Key provisions of the proposed legislation include:
The bill was introduced by Senator Davis and has eight co-sponsors.
Here is a link to a fact sheet about the bill with more details.
Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories Uncategorized3 Comments on Badlands National Park, New Year’s Eve There were no fires in Badlands National Park yesterday.
Click on the images to see larger versions. All photos were taken by Bill Gabbert.
After writing about the Colorado Springs Independent article reporting on their investigation into the management of the Waldo Canyon Fire, we looked into the availability of air tankers during that time frame.
On June 23, 2012, the day the fire started, there were eight large fires burning in Colorado and 16 uncontained large fires in the country. On June 26 when the Waldo Canyon Fire moved into Colorado Springs burning 346 homes and killing two people, there were 29 uncontained large fires burning in the United States.
However there were only nine large air tankers in the United States on national U.S. Forest Service exclusive use contracts, down from the 44 we had in 2002.
Two Korean War vintage air tankers crashed June 3, 2012, killing Capt. Todd Neal Topkins and First Officer Ronnie Edwin Chambless bringing the total from 11 down to 9. Four military Modular Airborne FireFighting System (MAFFS) C-130 air tankers were mobilized on June 24 and four more on June 29.
We may never know if the shortage of air tankers had anything to do with the loss of two lives and 346 homes in Colorado Springs. Fighting fire on the cheap does not save money.
I love living within 15 minutes of a national park. In this case it’s Wind Cave in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Late this afternoon I grabbed my cameras and drove into the park to see what was out and about.
I saw some deer in the distance and wanted to get some shots of them, but of all the large animals in Wind Cave, the deer are one of the more skittish. So I parked my truck where they could not see me and with a hill shielding me from their sight, I sneaked up to get as close as I could. When I crested the hill they saw me at the same time I saw them. They froze for one second and I quickly took this photo:
Then they immediately ran. And you can see why the species is named White Tail Deer:
Later I saw a herd of at least 50 elk about a half mile away — I was glad I had a 400mm lens. Here is a portion of the herd:
Continue reading “Photo safari in a national park”
