The Smokey Wire : National Forest News and Views
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According to Bill Gabbert over at Wildfire Today: Dr. Jack Cohen received the first National Legacy Award given by the U.S. Forest Service, National Association of State Foresters, National Fire Protection Association, and International Association of Fire Chiefs in recognition of outstanding career-long contributions to wildfire mitigation as an alternative to suppression. Dr. Cohen helped … Read more
Today, Rob Chaney with the Missoulian newspaper has an in-depth article featuring the expert opinions of Dr. Jack Cohen, a retired U.S. Forest Service fire scientist, and Missoula County Commissioner Dave Strohmaier regarding the “new” U.S. Forest Service strategy, “Confronting the Wildfire Crisis.” Readers of this blog will likely recognize Dr. Jack Cohen as the … Read more
Thanks to the LA Times Editorial Board for saying what many environmental groups have been saying for over two decades now. Let’s stop wasting time and money (and blaming wildfires on “environmental terrorists” or “environmental extremists”) and get to work in the Home Ignition Zone with a laser-like focus! A better way to help Californians … Read more
[NOTE: I wrote the following post on this blog on October 23, 2019 highlighting new research by a U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service scientist and University of Wisconsin-Madison partners. I’m reposting it 11 months later because it seems relevant to many of the recent discussions on the blog.] This morning I got an email … Read more
This post isn’t meant to serve as a be-all and end-all piece about all wildfires in general. Rather, it’s more specifically about the current Oregon wildfires burning in clearcut, heavily logged, and roaded areas of the Oregon Cascades. While these images and videos certainly don’t tell the entire story, they do tell part of the … Read more
In the interests of “how I would change what I wrote in the past given the 2020 fire season”, I remembered a series of posts from 2010 (many readers were not with us then) called Science Situations That Shout Watch Out. Here’s a link to 1-3, there is also 4, when scientists speak for nature … Read more
Like the many folks in the forest protection community have been saying for decades “we should question assumptions about wildfires.” That’s the title of a guest column by Dr. Jack Cohen and Missoula County Commissioner Dave Strohmaier in the print edition of today’s Missoulian. The title of the on-line version is different, and pasted below … Read more
The following guest post was written by Sarah Hyden. Sarah is the editor of a new website in development, focused on protection of the Santa Fe National Forest called The Forest Advocate. Sarah describes herself as “one of a growing number of citizen advocates deeply concerned about the severity of fuel treatments in our national … Read more
The following piece was written by Douglas Bevington, author of The Rebirth of Environmentalism: Grassroots Activism from the Spotted Owl to the Polar Bear (Island Press, 2009). It was published by Counterpunch. This month, some PBS stations around the country are airing a documentary titled Wilder than Wild: Forests, Fire, and the Future. It is a one-hour film … Read more
This morning I got an email from U.S. Forest Service Research News, which including a link to this new research from the USFS and partners concerning wildfires in California. While the research may be surprising to some, it’s not at all surprising to many of us who have said the same thing going back a … Read more