Engines

“The earth, born in fire, baptized by lightning, since before life’s beginning has been and is a fire planet.” E.V. Komarek.

Fires ignited by natural events such as lightning, may be managed as “Wildland Fire Use” events, allowing fire to play a natural role within the UCR landbase. Wildland Fire Use is most often applied in Wilderness areas but can be considered outside of Wilderness in certain areas designated in the Land Management Plan. The current Land Management Plans guiding resource management in the UCR allow for Fire Use within all of the Wilderness areas administered by the White River National Forest and Bureau of Land Management Grand Junction Field Office, as well as several non-wilderness areas on public lands administered by both BLM and Forest Service.

Managing these fires requires that strict planning and documentation be outlined in a wildland fire implementation plan. Factors considered during the planning process include short- and long-term weather forecasts, expected fire behavior and growth, threats to public and firefighter safety, air quality, and resource values at risk. As long as weather and fire behavior are within tolerable limits, the fire use event will be managed to burn within a maximum manageable area until it naturally extinguishes itself through the lack of fuel and/or a “season ending” event such as a major rain or snow storm. If a threat is identified and cannot be mitigated, actions are taken to mitigate or eliminate the threat.

Most of the approved Wildland Fire Use areas within the UCR are located in high elevation terrain and typically remain moist through a good portion of the fire season, hence fire occurrence is rare except during drier than average conditions. Based on a five year average, the UCR manages 10 -12 fires per year as Wildland Fire Use events. While the majority of the fire use events on the unit have been less than 800 acres in size, the Bigfish Fire in 2002 covered 17,000 acres in the Flattops Wilderness.

Unaweep Fire Use Module

Wildland Fire Use

http://www.fireuse.org/

Understanding Wildland Fire Use