Burning, Denial and Demoralized Fire Crews

  

It’s hardly a secret, as any simple analysis of the relationship between rising average temperatures and the number of actual wildfires will reflect, that the recent spate of catastrophic fires, worldwide has accelerated alarmingly in the past decade. We lost over 7 million acres last year from wildfires, most of which were in western states (North Carolina experienced the most extreme fires in the east). The vast majority of these fires are caused by human beings (from campfires, arson, backfires gone wrong to electrical utility negligence), enabled by exceptionally dry brush and old trees. Kindling and fuel made available in abundance because of climate change.

Every year, the First Street Foundation (a non-profit) releases its assessment of the wildfire risks we face. Its May 16th report is not pretty, as their map above suggests. Here is an excerpt: “Across the country, there are 49.4M properties with minor wildfire risk (with a cumulative burn probability below 1%); 20.2M properties with moderate risk (6% maximum cumulative burn probability); 6.0M with major risk (14% maximum burn probability); 2.7M with severe risk (26% maximum cumulative burn probability); and 1.5M properties with extreme risk (with cumulative burn probabilities of 26% and up). In total, approximately 71.8 million homes have some level of wildfire risk in 2022, growing by 11.1% to 79.8 million by 2050, owing to the impact of a changing climate.

“Fire Factor’s range from (1-10) to describe a property’s aggregate thirty-year exposure to wildfire, informed by the parcel’s burn probability at a 30 meter resolution, taking into account not only the burn probability of the current time period but also how the parcel’s wildfire risk changes over the next 30 years with a changing climate.” State and federal firefighters are woefully understaffed to meet the expected wildfire burdens we face this summer and beyond. Fire season is now longer and more intense than ever. 

States and the federal government increasingly rely on volunteer low-risk prisoners willing to fight these flames. Until recently, once prisoners were released, their incarceration disqualified them from continuing as bona fide, paid firefighter. That is changing. But these critical firefighters, who put their lives at risk, are facing exhausting burdens, severely short staffed at unjustifiable low levels of compensation. Writing for the June 21st Los Angeles Times, Alex Wigglesworth, tell us that firefighters from the U.S. Forest Service “paint a ‘dire picture’ of harsh conditions, low pay and PTSD. Many job vacancies go unfilled… Morale within the Forest Service has plummeted to an all-time low, current and former firefighters say…

“Morale within the Forest Service has plummeted to an all-time low, current and former firefighters say… The work is backbreaking physical labor that pays an average starting wage of $15 an hour, not including hazard pay and overtime. Raises promised in last year’s infrastructure bill remain in limbo. Low wages have combined with skyrocketing housing costs to ensure that many firefighters can’t afford to live in the places they work… Officials recently announced that they were unable to fill about 1,000 temporary firefighter positions and looking to make emergency hires by shortening the onboarding process.

“As California faces what is expected to be a punishing fire season, only 62% of federal firefighter positions here are filled, according to a source within the agency. Before 2020, nearly all spots nationwide typically would be filled at this time of year, said the source, who requested anonymity to discuss internal matters.

“In addition, roughly a third of all Forest Service fire engines in California are on five-day staffing, meaning there aren’t enough crew members to operate them seven days a week. An additional 13% of engines are ‘down staffed’ — essentially parked because of a lack of firefighters, the source said… The Forest Service has acknowledged challenges in reaching this year’s national target of 11,300 firefighters, especially in the Pacific Northwest and Southwest regions, which include Oregon, Washington and California.

“The recruitment and retention problems are in areas ‘where state and private firefighter wages are outcompeting federal firefighter wages, housing costs are not affordable, and positions are in remote locations,’ the agency said in a statement… In a recent survey of more than 700 current and former wildland firefighters conducted by a Forest Service firefighter and advocate, 78.5% of respondents reported mental health issues they attributed to the stresses of fighting fires, while just 32.3% said they felt they had the time and resources to seek help.” 

We have long since failed to tackle the underlying cause for this escalation in wildfire: failure to reduce our energy usage, especially to the extent is based on fossil fuels that generate the heat-capturing emission of greenhouse gasses. We can expect trillions and trillions of dollars of additional hard dollar costs directly attributable to climate change. Those costs will rise, but we keep treating the results of climate change, one-by-one. And that includes a most necessary increase in all things “wildfire fighters.” 

I’m Peter Dekom, and we continue to bear exponentially risings costs from climate change-caused disasters, while still refusing to mount the required measures to contain and curtail climate change itself.