“Let’s go make a forest”
Firefighter fatalities in Turkey 🖤, get ready player, 🌱 dark forestry thoughts, fire risk in Australia🔥, vintage firetrucks & vintage firefighters
If you read just one thing:
This week at Rain we were buoyed by this report by this fantastic report on what impact wildfire response times has, from The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, chock full of data about the cost of wildfires in California over the period 2017-2021. The report posits that an improvement of 15 minutes in response time would reduce things like greenhouse gas emissions, total burned area and—so relevantly for us in the Bay Area this morning—smoke days.
Research consistently shows that reductions in response times (i.e., the duration between initial detection and the arrival of the first suppression crew) are associated with reduced fire severity and a lower likelihood of fires escaping initial attack, thereby reducing acres burned, smoke days, and other fire-related impacts. —Moore Foundation
Notes from the Fire Tower is short this week so it’s all-in-one this week
Get your head in the game!
Fire, Generally
Maui update, insurance in detail, and fire risk in Australia
Climate
Data for data wonks, dark thoughts from tree planters of the 90s, slow season in Alaska, but hot trends.
Firefighting
Fatalities in Turkey, the olden days, pay cliffs, keep drones out, and annual remembrances.
Firetech
Really, Watch Duty! Business of home hardening, mapping fuels, and drones.
What’s burning?
Canada (it’s still there, still on fire), Washington, Oregon, Northern California, Africa
Notes from the Fire Tower
Get your head in the game!
I often feel that I’m not funny enough (see Shouts & Murmurs climate edition), or wise enough, or smart enough to say what I think out loud about this. I’m too earnest, and I care too much. But when Scientific American publishes works like, “Humans Have Crossed 6 of 9 ‘Planetary Boundaries”’ speaking up anyway in spite of my smallness feels like a simple place to start doing more. Otherwise my personal choice mostly is to tell epic, compelling stories about people building technology options that might help (from Makani to Rain). And of course, biking to work.
Reading, watching, and generally understanding what is happening in the world does also help, because like we said last week, disinformation is coming to a (political) theater near you. You could also opt to write letters to voters, or take action on something you care about by writing a U.S. Representative (today I wrote one about federal wildland firefighter pay). Tell CA Governor Newsome you’re psyched he’s backing this carbon emission bill. Garden a small area for bugs and birds. If you need someone to cry with, sit with a poet to remind you how crazy it is to care about more than one thing.
Or, if you want someone to Pump. You. Up. you could try this video with Al Pacino. It’s halftime!! Get your head in the game! I’m ready to get to work! (hat tip to Sarah Hunter)
Climate
Data for data wonks, dark thoughts from tree planters of the 90s, slow season in Alaska, but hot trends.
Bittersweet essay from a (formerly) optimistic early 1990s tree planter. “Let’s go make a forest!”
“The dangerous mistake we were making gets to the heart of what people often get wrong about environmental stewardship: the notion that, no matter how rapacious or careless we are, we can always dig or plant our way out through sweat, pluck and industry.” — Claire Cameron
Alaska had a slower fire season than usual, though you have to look a little more broadly at trends to understand what’s going on.
“Alaska wildfire numbers and acreage totals vary widely from year to year, but the record shows a definite pattern: The intervals between big fire years are getting shorter, a change scientists attribute to a warming climate. Additionally, the acreage totals in low years like 2023 are getting higher.” — Alaska Public Media
Fire, Generally
Maui update, insurance in detail, and fire risk in Australia
Maui is releasing lower fatality numbers in Lahaina (92), and lower missing persons (31), than they were previously, meanwhile lawsuits fly as debate intensifies about what caused the fires.
Excruciating detail on what it takes to insure a home in Truckee, CA. (hat tip Chris Anthony)
Australia announced a burn ban because of heightened risk there this year (they’ve had a couple less extreme years but the pattern suggests this is an area to watch—as our fire season ends, theirs begins).
Firefighting
Fatalities in Turkey, the olden days, pay cliffs, keep drones out, and annual remembrances.
🖤 Three firefighters 🖤 perished during refill operations over a lake in Turkey. One crew member swam to safety.
Firefighters continue to sound the alarm about expiring pay raises that could lead to a mass exodus of personnel in the midst of fire season.
Colorado Springs prepared for an annual remembrance ceremony for fallen firefighters.
“Notably, two-thirds of this year’s honorees died as a result of occupational cancer. ‘We’re really working to drive the surge of this epidemic of the disease out of firefighters,’ Ryan Heffernan, a spokesperson for the IAFF said.” — The Denver Gazette
Another stern warning to keep small drones well away from firefighting operations. “These incursions have raised serious concerns as they have led to the temporary suspension of critical aerial firefighting operations on a half-dozen incidents so far this year.”
I enjoyed poking through this fantastic set of old black & white photos documenting a pivotal fire for the Cazadero region in the late 1970s. Shared with me via Sara Winge, a friend who had served in the fire service, building what probably became the start of some of the data we use today at Rain. If you’re curious about how firefighters worked last century, and how effectively neighbors helped each other to defend homes and save livestock, this was a beautiful record of desperate, hard work on behalf of the community.
Firetech
Really, Watch Duty! Business of home hardening, mapping fuels, and drones.
I mentioned previously you should download the Watch Duty app, and this story from Washington State agrees with me (it’s literally a life saver). If you want more app ideas, this story on How I Battle Wildfire Anxiety in Slate has a roundup of other useful sites.
NPR says wildfire home hardening is… a business opportunity?
The EU is ordering a significant number of Canadairs, which might drive up the price for more orders… from the EU.
The University of Nevada, Reno is building a comprehensive statewide map of wildfire fuels in California.
“Though mapping of tree density is not a new practice, a project of this scale — and one that is able to factor in the ladder fuels hidden beneath the canopy of trees — is invaluable for the future of firefighting.“ —Sierra Sun
Ignus Firefighting, a Drone Amplified offering that sets drones up to light back burns for firefighters, is pitted against an all-terrain wheelchair for Coolest Thing Made in Nebraska, a bracket-style public-voting tournament. They are both pretty cool!
What’s burning?
Canada (it’s still there, still on fire), Washington, Oregon, Northern California, Africa
Fires in Canada where Rain co-founders Max & Ephraim grew up in Okanagan flared up again over the weekend.
Olympic National Park fires are surging, in Washington State.
Algeria, burning in a region that was also devastated last July.
It’s smoky for us at home again. Below you can see that where I can usually see San Francisco… there’s nothing but smoke.
Finally, this quotation has been sticking with me, it came up in relation to a reader comment last week (👋 John) and I thought it was worth highlighting again.
“I would love to tell you that the key to solving these problems is more research. But if we just stopped doing research and just use what we know, we’d be a lot better off.” —Mark Finney, Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory
Thanks so much for reading, it’s really appreciated.
Andrea