Copyright 2005 Albuquerque Journal
Snow Halts Bandelier Blaze Program
By RUSSELL MAX SIMON
Albuquerque Journal (New Mexico)
LOS ALAMOS, N.M. — Two inches of fresh snow in the Jemez Mountains on Tuesday forced the postponement of what would have been the first prescribed burn in Bandelier National Monument since the devastating Cerro Grande fire in 2000. Firefighters ready for a much bigger job instead worked on burning through slash piles over 75 acres near N.M. 4. But the main burn, aimed at eliminating wildfire fuel over 370 acres near the head of Frijoles Canyon, was put off until next year, said Forest Service officials.
Monday night’s storm left just a dusting in Los Alamos, where it had all but melted by mid-morning. But at the higher elevations where the burn was supposed to take place, it stuck throughout the day. “If you can’t get the ground fuels to burn, you just can’t accomplish your objectives,” said Forest Service Information Office David Eaker. While dozens of firefighters from Zuni Pueblo in western New Mexico burned piles of brush collected over the past months, the crucial ground fuels the larger burn was aimed at sat safe under the snow.
“It’s just not melting out there,” Eaker said.
Eaker said the area targeted by the burn was overdue for a major wildfire.
“This area is way past due, mostly because of Smokey Bear. When every fire was considered bad, we extinguished them all,” Eaker said.
The last major wildfire in the Frijoles Canyon area was about 100 years ago, Eaker said. Until the prescribed burn can take place next year, everyone will crossing their fingers there is nothing major happens during next year’s wildfire season.
“The situation just sets the stage for a very damaging wildfire. That’s exactly why we have to do this, so that when a natural does break out, and one will, it doesn’t get out of hand,” Eaker said before the decision to cancel Tuesday’s burn outright was made.
Firefighting personnel from as far as California and Idaho were in Los Alamos yesterday in preparation for the burn, and there were plans to bring in a hundred firefighters - far more than ordinarily would have been called for the prescribed area. The worries of some Los Alamos residents, fearful of a repeat of the Cerro Grande fire, spurred a considerable public information campaign from the agencies involved in planning. Numerous public information meetings were held in and around Los Alamos in preparation for the burn, which had been delayed on account of dry conditions this fall.
The National Forest Service, Bandelier, the Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the state Game and Fish Department all had a hand in the planning, since better inter-agency cooperation was made a goal in the wake of the Cerro Grande fire.
That fire, which destroyed more than 350 homes and torched roughly 43,000 acres, began as a prescribed burn by National Park Service employees but then burst out of control and raged through part of Los Alamos. While Los Alamos residents might be both relieved that there won’t be a burn this year yet fearful about wildfire conditions next year, Zuni firefighters were definitely disappointed in Tuesday’s cancellation. Several said they were looking forward to the bigger burn that would have happened today and to a busy rest of the week.