Caution urged with arrival of spring wildfire season

ASHEVILLE – The warm spring winds blowing through Western North Carolina’s forests are welcomed by the winter weary, but they put firefighters on edge.

With the trees still yet to “leaf out,” sunshine readily reaches the ground, drying out fuels that can feed destructive wildfires.

Federal and state forestry officials are urging the public to exercise caution with the arrival of the spring fire season.

Nine out of 10 wildfires in North Carolina are started by people, often when the burning of yard debris gets out of hand, said Steve Little, assistant fire management officer with the U.S. Forest Service in Asheville.

“The occurrence of fires we have in the spring is directly related to people’s activity,” he said. “If people leave their debris piles unattended, the embers can get out into the leaves and then start a fire that is hard to catch.”

Last year there were 3,374 wildfires that scorched 9,451 acres on state and private lands in North Carolina, with another 61 fires burning 4,907 acres on federal property.

Dave Walker, district forester with the N.C. Forest Service, said the spring fire season typically ends anywhere from mid-May to early July.

“The leaves are off the trees, so the sun can hit the forest floor and dry it out,” he said. “These fronts come through with low humidities and high winds and sometimes very little rain. The warm, dry, windy weather in the spring is what causes the fire to spread readily.”

Walker said there’s also a fall fire season, which generally runs from mid-October into December.

“The leaves are dead on the ground and the sun dries them out,” he said.

More than 40 percent of all wildfires in the state are caused by careless debris burning.

“We get a lot of people out there who are getting their gardens ready, cleaning up their yards and burning banks,” Walker said. “Sometimes they don’t watch them so well or burn when they shouldn’t. You should burn when the humidities are up, the winds are down and the temperatures are cooler.”

Even better is to wait until the summer to burn debris when leaves are on the trees and there’s grassy vegetation on the forest floor, or to not burn at all. Yard waste can be composted, he said.

When burning it’s important to have a sufficient area cleared out around the debris pile, and to have the proper tools such as a rake, shovel and water hose if available, and a cellphone to call for help, Walker said.

“If the fire gets away from your control, call first and then fight it,” he said.

Unattended campfires also can easily start a blaze in the woods. Little said investigators believe that a wildfire that burned some 2,000 acres in Linville Gorge last year was started by a campfire that was left unattended on a dry, windy day.

As development has increased in North Carolina, many homes and communities have been built in what’s called the wildland/urban interface, increasing their risk of burning in wildfires. A 2000 study found the state ranks first in the amount of land area and fifth in the number of homes within such zones.

“Nowadays a 10-acre fire in Western North Carolina almost always threatens a structure almost immediately,” Walker said. “Those houses are very much as risk. Oftentimes these fires are moving so fast it’s hard to protect them.

“It’s a significant problem in Western North Carolina and one we pay a lot of attention to. There’s a lot of development in the woods.”

Walker said that so far this year across the state, wildfires have threatened and firefighters have protected 4,808 homes and structures with an estimated value of $480 million.

Over the same period, wildfires burned 12 homes worth about $1 million and 115 structures such as barns and outbuildings worth $870,000.

In 2007, a wildfire destroyed nine homes in Swain County’s Grassy Ridge community. Firefighters said the blaze moved at 25 mph and had walls of flame 20 feet high. Brush and dead leaves that had built up around the houses contributed to the problem.

Tips to avoid wildfires

When burning debris:

• Always consider an alternative to burning such as composting.

• Don’t burn on dry, windy days.

• Be prepared with water, a shovel and phone.

• Stay with the fire until it’s completely out.

When burning a campfire:

• Allow the wood to burn completely to ash if possible.

• Pour lots of water on the fire, drowning all the embers, not just the red ones.

• Pour until the hissing sound stops.

• Stir the ashes and embers with a shovel.

• Make sure everything is wet and cold to touch.