Most every year the Volunteer Fire Department in Hot Springs, South Dakota, burns the brush and small trees along the channel of the Fall River in order to keep the waterway clear for flood control. Today they began their annual burning. The weather conditions as measured at the weather station at the Hot Springs Municipal Airport was 43 degrees, with a relative humidity of 93%. And there was occasional drizzling rain.
The device, pulled behind a tractor over a grassy prairie, uses propane burners under a metal structure to burn a five-foot wide black line, an area of burned vegetation, on the edge of a planned prescribed fire. Water spray nozzles, 16 of them, wet down the edges as the unit moves forward at about one mile an hour. In association with an adjacent mowed line, this can serve as a barrier to the prescribed fire spreading beyond the planned perimeter.
On Thursday the USF&WS demonstrated it at the Valentine National Wildlife Refuge in northern Nebraska. The Norfolk Daily News covered the event, but they got a little confused about the number and placement of the water nozzles and propane burners.
I’ve never seen one in action, but it may put in black line more quickly, with fewer people and with less risk of escape than conventional methods. It no doubt works best on an area with gentle terrain, grass fuels, and few rocks. But it’s probably fun to play with.
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UPDATE March 27, 2011
It occurs to me from reading the comments that some people are not familiar with the concept of blacklining a prescribed fire prior to the main ignition of the project. Depending on the tactics and the wind direction, the process of igniting along the perimeter can be a rather slow and tedious process until you get 5 to 30 feet of burned area, or black, adjacent to the perimeter. If the project is small and you have plenty of time and resources this may not be an issue. But if your project is large and you would like to minimize the number of operational periods devoted to igniting it, blacklining days or weeks before the burn can save you a lot of time. And you can have a broader prescription for blacklining than the main burn, making it possible to black line on days that would not be suitable for the larger project.
Blacklining the Dillon Prescribed Fire, Badlands National Park, Oct. 10, 2002. Photo by Bill Gabbert
The Dillon Prescribed Fire shown above, was 3,132 acres. By blacklining the perimeter in advance, we were able to ignite the entire project in one day, while reducing the chances of an escape.
Blacklining can be especially useful prior to aerial ignition, as was the case on the Dillon project above. In some areas access on the Dillon was very difficult due to badlands. In those areas, instead of using engines and a water tender for support during blacklining, we used ATV’s with water tanks.
The Arizona Department of Environmental Quality is investigating an incident on the Kaibab National Forest in which thousands of creosote-treated railroad ties were burned.
From the Arizona Daily Sun:
U.S. Forest Service employees conducting a prescribed fire at the end of February also set an estimated thousands of chemically treated railroad ties ablaze southwest of Tusayan.
The Arizona Department of Environmental Quality is investigating the fire, as the Kaibab National Forest would have needed special permission to dispose of the creosote-treated wood.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers creosote (a coal-tar product used to protect wood from insects and rotting) a possible cancer-causing agent and warns the public not to burn it in fireplaces at home due to risk of releasing “toxic chemicals.”
Creosote-treated wood poses possible risks when used as landscaping, or if in contact with drinking water, the Environmental Protection Agency warns.
Along with items such as batteries and car tires, it’s also illegal under state law for residents to burn chemically treated wood as part of trash-disposing fires.
Fire officers working under the direction of Fire Management Officer Gary Bishop disposed of these railroad ties by adding them to a slash-burning fire, said Jackie Banks, a spokeswoman for the Kaibab National Forest.
Bishop did not immediately return a call seeking comment on Tuesday.
The site of the fire is off Forest Road 347, near a rail line headed from Williams to the Grand Canyon at the edge of the national forest.
“They thought they were doing a good thing by removing fuels that could have posed a lot of problems were they to catch fire during fire season,” Banks said.
ADEQ called on a report that the fire was still smoldering more than a week later, and the Forest Service learned it had erred, Banks said.
“We acknowledge that it was a mistake. We have handed over whatever information we have” to ADEQ, Banks said.
The environmental agency’s reports show that the Forest Service had permission to burn brush and other forest materials on Feb. 28, but not railroad ties or chemically treated wood.
ADEQ has not taken any enforcement action to date but says it is investigating the case.
Here are two photos taken on March 3, 2011 of a prescribed fire at Fort Indiantown Gap in Pennsylvania.
They are described as follows on flickr where several more photos can be found.
Following work by the Aerial Ignition Crew the prescribed burn progresses at Fort Indiantown Gap on March 3, 2011 . Fort Indiantown Gap conducted the 2,500 acre burn in the training area using an aerial ignition technique using ping pong sized balls filled with [snip] that are injected with [snip] and dropped from a helicopter over the area designated for prescribed burning. Prescribed burns help reduce the potential of major wildfires on Fort Indiantown Gap property and more than 100 prescribed burns have occurred at the installation in the past decade. These burns are always conducted by properly trained personnel with an approved plan and coordinated with the appropriate authorities. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Ted Nichols/Released)
I wish people would not publicize the formula for creating these “ping pong balls”.
The Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center recently posted three reports: 1) An After Action Review, 2) A Facilitated Learning Analysis, and 3) a 72-Hour Report.
1) Painter Piles escaped pile burning project, After Action Review; Black Hills National Forest near Custer, South Dakota, March 12, 2010. While the title of the report is “Painter Piles After Action Review”, the terms “Painter prescribed fire” and “Windsong prescribed fire” are both used in the report. Here is an excerpt from the Executive Summary:
On March 12, 2010, a U.S. Forest Service prescribed fire near the town of Custer, South Dakota, spread onto Forest and Private Lands. The slopover was contained within the first burning period and was not declared a wildfire. The pile had been ignited on March 10, 2010, and was one of the thousands in the Painter project. The Windsong Incident involved one land owner.
Some of the private land that burned. USFS photo
The Windsong Prescribed Fire was immediately adjacent to the Forest boundary and was managed by the Hell Canyon Ranger District (RD) of the Black Hills National Forest, in the Rocky Mountain Region of the U.S. Forest Service. Prescribed fire was planned to treat up to 3200 acres of hazardous fuels (piled slash) on National Forest land. The Windsong Incident consisted of 8.1 acres outside the intended treatment area, including 0.5 acres of private land. The fire traveled down slope and directly threatened one single family dwelling, and two out buildings. Damage to private property was minimal including one scorched pine, one small cedar tree, and scorched fence post.
2) Cooter’s Bog escaped prescribed fire, Facilitative Learning analysis, Kisatchie National Forest, in Louisiana, April 26, 2010. Here is the text from the Introduction:
On Tuesday, April 26, 2010 on the Calcasieu Ranger District of the Kisatchie National Forest, Louisiana, the 709 acre Cooter’s Bog Prescribed Burn (Compartment 132) was implemented. After completion of the firing phase of prescribed burn operations, a pine snag caught fire and threw embers outside of control lines, causing a spot fire in a pine plantation on adjacent private lands. The fire intensity and size of the escape grew rapidly and exceeded the capabilities of onsite resources for that burn unit. The FMO declared the escape a wildfire at 1445, per direction in the prescribed burn plan. The wildfire eventually burned 132 acres of pine plantation before being brought under control by on-site and contingency resources.
3) Smoky Hill Wind Farm Engine Burnover, 72-Hour Report, Lincoln County, Kansas, January 29, 2011. This incident is very similar to another engine burnover that occurred in Stafford County Kansas on November 3, 2010, except in that case the firefighters escaped unharmed. Here is the “sequence of events” from the report about the January 29 incident:
The initial responding engine entered the pasture involved, and went up to the top of a hill in an attempt to find access to attack from the black, in order to be able to work from within a safety zone. They were unable to find immediate access to the burned area, and for reasons as-yet unknown, their engine stalled. They got out, and were almost immediately overrun by the head fire. They ran laterally out of the head fire, back towards where they had come from, which placed them in unburned fuel on one flank of the fire. At that point, a wind shift converted that flank to the new head, and threatened to overrun them again, as the rate of spread was too fast to outrun. The initial attack IC was nearby in a pickup, and was able to drive over and remove them before the new head fire again overran them. He estimates the time frame for this sequence of events was under one minute from onset until he had them in his vehicle and was driving away.
The first firefighter, who was going to be doing the direct attack, was wearing full structural bunker gear (not wildland PPE), consisting of boots, pants, coat, gloves, and helmet, except for his Nomex hood. He did have a “grass mask” on. He sustained 2nd and 3rd degree burns in the areas between his helmet, mask, and coat. He was treated initially at a local hospital, and is receiving outpatient treatment from the burn unit, but the area burned is small enough it did not require inpatient treatment. The other firefighter was the driver of the engine, and as such was only wearing bunker pants and boots over street clothes. He sustained burns on his face, neck, hands, and arms. Burns were initially identified as 2nd degree and have now been determined to involving some 3rd degree burns as well. He remains an inpatient in the burn unit in Wichita at this time.
The engine involved experienced significant body damage, but after the fire had moved past, it was discovered with its pump still running, and the interior was intact. It was started and driven back to the fire station after the fire.
Smoke from a prescribed fire in southern Mississippi caused a chain-reaction crash that involved a school bus on Friday. The U. S. Forest Service conducted a prescribed fire near Bethel Road in Harrison County which produced smoke that mixed with fog, reducing the visibility to near zero. As the school bus entered the smoke on Highway 15, the driver quickly slowed down and was hit from behind, followed by a six-vehicle chain-reaction crash. Thankfully there were no serious injuries.
Mississippi Highway Patrol spokesman Master Sergeant Johnny Poulos said:
The conditions today were not favorable for safe driving. We have the fog that came in that actually kept the smoke down to the roadway. Just a really bad situation when you’re trying to drive and navigate, especially with a school bus.
The Forest Service had signs posted on the highway that warned drivers about the smoke. Spokesman Mario Rossilli released a statement for the agency:
Safety is a top priority for the National Forests in Mississippi. Fortunately, according to reports, there were no serious injuries sustained in the accident today. The National Forests in Mississippi has already begun what will be a comprehensive review of this incident. We are always looking for ways to further enhance safety. Prescribed burning is actually one method of creating a safer forest environment for visitors, including those in vehicles, by reducing the threat of catastrophic wildfire. Stakeholders, including local, county and state law enforcement are notified before burns are initiated. Our Forest Service Law Enforcement Officers are active participants in our prescribed burns.
Here is a video about the accident from WLOX in Biloxi, MS:
Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories Uncategorized11 Comments on Black lining machine used in Nebraska 
