Firebomber Publications Blog

Wildfire News Of The Day (the Firebomber Publications blog) provides comprehensive international wildfire news. Subscribers include over 10,000 personnel from fire agencies, contractors, and government entities on five continents. "BEST NEWSLETTER I HAVE EVER SEEN IN MY 32 YEARS IN THE FIRE SERVICE" - San Diego Fire Department Chief Brian Fennessy.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

WILDFIRE NEWS OF THE DAY - 021812

A new bill introduced into the California Legislature would require prisons to provide more detailed criminal- and prison-history reports on inmate firefighters to officials at fire camps (1); while forest owners attending a timber tax workshop put on by Texas Forest Service learned how to recoup their losses from wildfires (2). With the onset of Kentucky's spring fire season, officials from the Division of Forestry Environmental Education Section reminded residents of the danger wildfires pose even this early in the year (3); but Florida Forest Service investigators are trying to determine whether off-road vehicles started a 1,200-acre wildfire in Lake County (4). Three interesting studies related to wildfires were unveiled at the American Association for the Advancement of Science conference in British Columbia, Canada: the first provided disturbing data on how peat fires could accelerate climate change, worsening wildfires worldwide (5); another study from the University of Tasmania stated that an estimated 350-450 million hectares are burned by wildfires annually, killing 339,000 people each year either directly or indirectly (6); and a speaker from Simon Fraser University was sharing his knowledge of what forest fires were like in the distant past (7). There is a debate about allowing lumber companies to process so-called "white zone wood" in parts of Alberta, Canada, visited by wildfires (8); while the wildfire danger posed by dry kashi grass in the Indian state of Karnataka is the focus of the next article (9). Margaret River, Western Australia, is continuing to recover from devastating bushfires that struck the region late last year (10). And finally, firefighters in Rockport, Texas, performed their good deed of the day: rescuing a baby bunny from a debris burn!

(1) Bill urges more data on inmates; At fire camps, 'no idea what crimes' they committed

(2) Timber Tax Workshop aims to help landowners recoup drought, wildfire losses

(3) Forest fire season begins

(4) 1,200-acre fire blankets area with ash

(5) Wildfires kill 339,000 people per year: study

(6) Peat fires could accelerate climate change

(7) AAAS-SFU research: Controlling forest fires

(8) Buchanan seeks support to access white zone wood

(9) The fire-prone dry kashi grass of Shidlaghatta

(10) Margaret River finding its feet

(11) Rockport firefighter rescues baby bunny from burning brush pile

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