SPOKANE — Thinning forests of fuel, pre-certifying more volunteer firefighters and greater use of drone aircraft were some of the ideas put forward to reduce the size of future wildfires in Washington at a roundtable discussion Wednesday chaired by U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell and U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rodgers.
This year saw the biggest wildfire season in state history, with more than 1 million acres burned and three firefighters killed.
“We had the fire season we had all feared,” said McMorris-Rodgers, R-Washington, who represents the Spokane region.
Cantwell, D-Washington, said this was also the longest fire season in state history, thanks to drought conditions, and battling the fires cost $319 million. “We need to be better prepared for the next fire season,” she said.
Cantwell noted that forecasts call for a warm winter with lower-than-average snowpack, which could set the stage for another big fire season in 2016.
Moving through Congress is a proposal that would remove firefighting costs from the budget of the U.S. Forest Service and place them under the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Under the current system, the Forest Service often has to use funds intended for thinning and maintaining forests to fight fires. The lack of maintenance work then leads to bigger fires in future years, the lawmakers said.
McMorris-Rodgers said after the meeting that a bill to place firefighting funds under the FEMA budget had passed the House. Cantwell said a bill to make that change might be introduced as early as next week in the Senate.
But the lawmakers were mostly there to listen to a group that included representatives of fire departments, local politicians, private business and Indian tribes talk about ways to reduce the size of future wildfires.
There was general agreement that spending more money to remove fuel from the state’s dry forests would dramatically reduce costs.
Cantwell said studies show that reducing fuels in the forest can cut firefighting costs by two-thirds in the course of a season.
“The game changes when we have the ability to manage a fire,” said Russ Vaagen, a vice president of Vaagen Bros. Lumber Co. in Colville.
Chris Schulte, chief of the Connell Fire Department, agreed. “Fuel treatment was worth every penny we spent,” Schulte said, noting it was much cheaper to contain a fire burning in an area that had been managed.
Okanogan County has been particularly ravaged by wildfires for the past two years. Three firefighters died battling fires there this summer.
“They said this was a 100-year fire season, but they said that last year, too,” said Jon Wyss, president of the Okanogan Farm Bureau.
The fire season was so bad that the state put out a call for volunteers to fight the flames and mobilized the National Guard to help.
But numerous local officials said the height of fire season was too late to seek hundreds or thousands of volunteers. They said the state should find and certify volunteers before fire season so they are ready to help as soon as needed. That included having them trained in advance to use emergency fire shelters and equipped with the proper clothing and tools, they said.
“Volunteer firefighters are a critical tool,” Vaagen said. “We want to have people trained, on standby.”
The state also needs better weather forecasting equipment, especially Doppler radar in central Washington, for early warning of explosive fire conditions, Cantwell said.
Schulte said firefighters needed to become open to using drone aircraft for jobs such as searching for hot spots in burned areas. Drones can pose a danger to airplanes and helicopters that are battling flames.
“We need to learn to use drones to help us,” Schulte said.
