About the National Preparedness Levels (wildfires in the United States)

 I suspect that many of you have heard various websites refer to the National Preparedness Level, a five level scale where as you go up the scale from 1 to 5. I find the current National Preparedness Level on the main fire info page of the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) . Rather than try to do a perhaps inadequate job of explaining this to you, I thought that I go to the horses mouth, so to speak. I don't know about you, but I do find it useful to know what each level means, so I went to the NIFC website to learn more. We are currently at Preparedness Level 4, and depending on when you read this, the preparedness level may be higher or lower.

So here goes, you may download a pdf file about the National Preparedness Levels from the NIFC here.

The National Multi-Agency Coordination Group (NMAC) establishes Preparedness Levels throughout the calendar year to help assure that firefighting resources are ready to respond to new incidents. Preparedness Levels are dictated by fuel and weather conditions, fire activity, and resource availability. 

The five Preparedness Levels range from 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest level. Each Preparedness Level has specific management directions. As the Preparedness Levels rise, more federal and state employees become available for fire mobilization if needed.

Preparedness Level 1

• Geographic Areas accomplish incident management objectives utilizing local resources with little or no national support.

• Conditions are not favorable to support significant wildland fire activity in most geographic areas.
• Resource capability is adequate with little or no mobilization of resources occurring through the National Interagency Coordination Center.

• Potential for emerging significant wildland fires is expected to remain minimal.

Preparedness Level 2

• Active Geographic Areas (GA's) are unable to independently accomplish incident management objectives. Resource capability remains stable enough nationally to sustain incident operations and meet objectives in active GA's.

• Significant wildland fire activity is increasing in a few geographic areas.

• Resources within most geographic areas are adequate to manage the current situation, with light to moderate mobilization of resources occurring through the National Interagency Coordination Center.

• Potential for emerging significant wildland fires is normal to below normal for the time of year.

Preparedness Level 3

• Mobilization of resources nationally is required to sustain incident management operations in the active Geographic Areas (GA's). National priorities established as a necessary measure to address the heavy and persistent demand for shared resources among active GA's.

• Significant wildland fire activity is occurring in multiple geographic areas, with Incident Management Teams (IMTs) actively engaged.

• Mobilization of resources through the National Interagency Coordination Center is moderate to heavy.

• Potential for emerging significant wildland fires is normal for the time of year. 

Preparedness Level 4

• Shared resources are heavily committed. National mobilization trends affect all Geographic Areas (GA's) and regularly occur over larger and larger distances. National priorities govern resources of all types. Heavy demand on inactive/low activity GA's with low levels of activity for available resources.

• Significant wildland fire activity is occurring in multiple geographic areas; significant commitment of Incident Management Teams.

• NICC increasingly engages GACCs in an effort to coordinate and fill orders for available resources.

• Potential for significant incidents emerging in multiple GA’s indicates that resource demands will continue or increase.  

Preparedness Level 5 

• National mobilization is heavily committed and measures need to be taken to support GA's. Active GA's must take emergency measures to sustain incident operations.

• Full commitment of national resources is ongoing.

• Resource orders filled at NICC by specifically coordinating requests with GACCs as resources become available.

• Potential for emerging significant wildland fires is high and expected to remain high in multiple geographic areas. 

Obtained on August 17, 2020 from https://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/fireinfo_prepLevels.html

Rim Fire - Yosemite - On the role of fire management

Yesterday I was visiting the Yosemite National Park website and I went to one of their multimedia pages called Yosemite Presents where I saw their video on the Rim Fire, also available on Youtube under Yosemite Presents. It turned out that I had bookmarked the video and I think that I first learned about the video from Wildfire Today (January 12, 2015).

I watched the video again yesterday, in fact I watched the video a couple of times and since I am in the process of researching the Rim Fire Post-Fire Recovery, I thought I'd share the video with you today. What I like about this video is that they talk about the role that controlled burns (including prescribed burns) can play to reduce the damage done by wildfires. I like the  explanation that accompanies Yosemite's Rim Fire Video:

As these unnaturally large fires become more commonplace due to previous fire suppression and climate change, Yosemite National Park is seeing the benefits of carefully allowing smaller, controlled fires on the landscape.

You will hear Deputy Fire Chief Taro Pusina talk about the firing operations his crew did during the Rim Fire with the aim of stopping the fire before it reached the Merced River drainage and two giant sequoia groves. They also talk about the role of prescribed burns in helping wildfires such as the Rim Fire from not burning quite as hot as it could, slowing down and cooling fires such as the Rim Fire.

Phragmites, marshes and brushfires

 I have lived in various locations on the east coast of the USA all my life in various states boarding the Ocean. I have spent a fair amount of time in various fresh and salt water wetland areas and am very familiar with a tall wetland invasive known as a phragmite or common reed. I have also lived near wetlands where phragmites had invaded the wetland where the agencies overseeing the wetland worked to control the invasive. I have also seen my fair share of fires in these marshes. Fortunately, the marsh fires that I saw posed next to no threat to residences but the smoke did interfere with traffic on nearby roads.

So, I was very interested when I came across and article from NY1 on efforts by the National Park Service to use a machine known as a marsh master to cut firelines in a marshy area of Staten Island to make the area safer for residents. I do recall at least one, possibly more brush fires in these Staten island marshes within the last couple of years. Go here to read about these efforts by the NPS in Staten Island.

I will be interested to see how things turn out in this area of Staten Island during the next fire season in the residential neighborhoods of Staten Island adjoining marshes.

Fire and fuel breaks in NJ's wildland urban inerface

I recently had the opportunity to learn a little about fire management practices in the wildland urban interface in the pinelands in central and southern NJ through attending a day long Forest Stewardship Firewise Tour. One of the fire management practices that I learned about that day are fire and fuel breaks. I got a handout that morning:  Wildfire: Best management practices for creating and maintaing wildfire fuelbreaks in New Jersey's Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) is available on the NJ Forest Fire Service's website at this location (a pdf file). This document starts with some definitions, some that I will include here and then moves on to a discussion of what the individual homeowner living in the WUI can do.

Further, fire and fuel breaks are also built and maintained along natural or constructed "roads" through the WUI. In  February of 2010, I wrote about firebreaks that were planned for Barnegat NJ, go here to see that article. I had a chance to visit one such fire and fuel break in Stafford Township, NJ within the burn area of 15,000 acre 2007 Warren Grove fire. To be honest, I'm not quite sure if this was the firebreak that I wrote about in February 2010, but I don't think that really matters.

I'll start with briefly summarizing some definitions from the document I referred to earlier, Wildfire: Best management practices for creating and maintaing wildfire fuelbreaks in New Jersey's Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) :

Firebreak:  A natural or constructed barrier used to stop or check fires
that occur, or to provide a control line from which to work.

Fuelbreak:  A natural or manmade change in fuel characteristics that
affect fire behavior so that fires burning into them can be more readily
controlled and managed.

Keeping these definitions in mind, I had a chance to visit the Hay Rd. fire and fuel break in Stafford Township, NJ within the burn area of the 2007 Warren Grove fire.

Here are some pictures that I took that day. Hay Rd. itself is the firebreak. The fuel break is on one side of the road. Hay Rd. is a sand road a little to the north west of the Stafford Township Recycling Center, that may be found on this image from wikimapia.

Other relevant links of interest from the NJ Forest Fire Service website:

Wildfire hazard mitigation
Prescribed burning
Fire planning (including links at bottom of page)
Fire hazard regulations
Definitions

Firebreak to be constructed in Barnegat NJ (in the Pine Barrens)

The last large wildfire that burned in the New Jersey Pine Barrens was the Warren Grove Fire that burned over 15,000 acres in May of 2007. In January 2009, I wrote about a couple of trips I took to the Pine Barrens with references to the Warren Grove Fire and posted some photos of how the area has come back after the fire, go here to read this post.

Among the areas affected by this fire were clusters of residences in Barnegat and Stafford Townships NJ. These communities adopted a fire safety plan in November of 2008 that included the construction of firebreaks. Someone recently sent me this article from the Asbury Park Press about a planned firebreak along Pancoast Road on the border of Barnegat and Ocean Townships in New Jersey. I believe that this firebreak may have been a part of the fire safety plan passed in November 2008.

Note that this article may only be freely available until this Thursday, Feb. 25. The article says in part:

A nearly three-mile long fire break to protect adult communities in Barnegat got a green light Friday from the state Pinelands Commission, a step toward what fire wardens say will be a 200-foot wide selective thinning of a dense pine-oak forest along Pancoast Road on the boundary of Barnegat and Ocean townships.

The plan is similar to a project along Hay Road in Stafford, and likewise inspired by the great May 2007 forest fire that forced thousands to evacuate their homes west of the Garden State Parkway. Since then, the commission, the state Forest Fire Service and municipal officials have been working with community groups to be better prepared against wildfires.

The plan was presented last weekend to one community meeting in Barnegat, where a longtime resident told of a 1928 fire that destroyed his family's home, division fire warden Gergory McLaughlin recounted to commissioners Friday at their monthly meeting in Pemberton Township.

In the event of another major blaze, "this fire break is our last ditch attempt to protect those communities and our firefighters," McLaughlin said. ...

The plan is to selectively remove trees up to 200 feet from the north side of Pancoast Road, along 2.9 miles, and create "a more open, park-like forest," and lower the shrub height somewhat but not completely clearing to the ground, McLaughlin said. That aims to reduce the "fire ladder" of flammable low growth that can light the fuse for a fast-moving "crown fire" that burns high in the forest canopy and quickly skips from tree to tree, he explained. State foresters would periodically maintain the fire break to manage its growth density and fuel levels.

(Kirk Moore "Fire-break planned along Barnegat-Waretown line" Asbury Park Press, February 19, 2009, obtained on February 21, 2009 from http://www.app.com/article/20100219/NEWS/100219115/Fire-break-planned-along-Barnegat-Waretown-line).

What is a firebreak? According to the Glossary of Wildland Fire Terminology of the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) a firebreak is a natural or constructed barrier used to stop or check fires that may occur, or to provide a control line from which to work.

In an ideal situation, I would of waited a couple of more days to post this to allow myself time to try and find out some more information for you. But if I did that then I risked having an expired link in my article, so I am posting this today. If I am able to find more information on this firebreak, I'll make some follow-up posts.

In the meantime, I'll be making a couple of more posts on BAER and hydromulching so stay tuned.

Fire Safety Plan adopted in two communities in NJ Pine Barrens

In my wonderings recently on the NJ Pinelands Commission website, I found this draft version, Fire Safety Initiative: Stafford and Barnagat Townships (NJ). I skimmed it several days and was especially interested in plans to build fire breaks along residential areas in the two townships that are especially vulnerable to wildfires. I made a mental note to add spending some quality time with this plan to read up on what they are planning to do.

Just this morning, I was reading the posts in the general discussion forum on wildland fire when I came across a post in a thread on news from the NJ forest fire service community with a link to this Nov. 8th article from the Asbury Park Press reporting that Stafford and Barnagat Townships have officially adopted this plan.

One of the policy issues relating to wildfires that I am interested in relate to issues facing communities such as Stafford and Barnagat Townships in NJ who are on the wildland/urban interface. These two communities are in the NJ Pine Barrens near the Warren Grove military base. In May 2007, a fire, known as the Warren Grove fire, burned 10,000+ acres including portions of both townships. If I am not mistaken, the Warren Grove fire was started by a flare dropped from a military plan from Warren Grove on a training run. I believe that this fire safety plan was adopted, in part, in response to this fire.

Sunrise Wildfires (1995) Long Island Pine Barrens

Some of you, especially those of you in the NY and NJ areas, may recall that 1995 was especially dry, creating prime conditions for wildfires in this region. I have been reading about the wildfires that burned the Long Island Central Pine Barrens for 13 days in late August and early September of that year. Approximately 6,800 acres were burned.

The Westhampton Volunteer Fire Department has a webpage on this fire with a couple of photos. Some picture of the fire, from the Riverhead Fire Department may be found here.

For those of you who are interested in such things, a copy of the (Long Island) Central Pine Barrens Fire Management Plan, dated August 1999 may be found here.

containment

The researcher part of me got the better of me this afternoon when I tried to find a definition of what it means when, for example, it was reported that the basin complex fire is 100% contained.

I finally found this glossary with short definitions of many of the terms that I have been reading about.

After reading some definitions in this glossary and the much longer Fireline Handbook (I should warn you that this Handbook is over 400 pages long and comes in at over 3 MB). I decided to keep it simple and not to worry about precise definitions of containment as used in connection to the basin complex fire because I was getting into multiple definitions. I also started asking myself questions like does the meaning of containment vary with measures used to fight individual wildfires? And does containing a fire in the NJ Pine Barrens mean something different than containing a fire such as the basin complex fire. I decided that the important thing is that the basin complex fire is contained.

The map was obtained on July 29, 2008 from http://165.221.39.44/incident/maps/large/1367/0/