GREAT FALLS — Montana, renowned for its vast wilderness and majestic mountains, is also highly susceptible to wildfires. As we enter the peak of fire season, understanding how to prevent and manage wildfires is crucial.
Fire-Adapted Landscapes
"Montana is a fire-adapted landscape," explains Samsara Duffey, a Forest Service Fire Lookout. "Many plants and trees here require fire for healthy growth and reproduction." However, predicting the severity of the fire season is challenging. "It's a trite answer, but when asked about the fire season, the typical firefighter response is, 'Ask me in October.'"
Weather Patterns and Fire Risk
Katherine Sears, from Fire Prevention at the DNRC, elaborates on how weather affects fire risk: "In the Northeastern Land Office, around Lewistown, we’ve received a normal amount of precipitation so far. But come July, it’s like the faucet shuts off, and we don't get the rain we need."
Duffey adds, "The timing of spring rains significantly impacts vegetation. These rains help plants grow and get absorbed into trees, reducing their flammability."
Human-Caused Fires
While many wildfires are natural, human-caused fires result in preventable destruction. After a recent May snowstorm in the Little Belt Mountains, many trees were downed, increasing the risk of fire. "There's a lot of downed trees, which can lead to ladder fuels," says Sears.
Duffey emphasizes fire prevention tips: "As Smokey says, only you can prevent wildfires. Ensure your campfire is out, don’t drag chains, and don’t flick cigarettes."
Reporting and Preventing Fires
It's essential to be vigilant and report signs of fire. However, nature can sometimes play tricks. Duffey shares, "There's a weather phenomenon called a 'water dog,' where a cloud resembling smoke appears after a light rain."
Sears highlights the role of the DNRC in fire prevention: "Depending on where you live, your land office can conduct a home assessment to help make your property more resilient to wildfire."
As we navigate the fire season, awareness and preparedness are key. By understanding the natural and human factors contributing to wildfires, and taking proactive steps, we can help protect Montana's beautiful landscapes and communities. To contact th Montana DNRC for fire updates go to https://www.mtfireinfo.org/
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Here are some resources to help you understand wildfires - how big they are, where they are, and more.
MT Fire Info (website): An official state website that features a clickable map and information about current wildfires burning in Montana, fire restrictions, smoke and air quality, and preparedness.
Inciweb (website): A federal website that highlights large wildfires burning across the country. Information for each listed fire includes latest information, maps, and usually photos and/or videos.
Smoke Forecasts (website): The Montana Department of Environmental Quality maintains this site to provide details about wildfire smoke and its effects; it also includes data about wildfire smoke that blows into Montana from other areas, including the western U.S. and Canada.
WILDFIRE TERMINOLOGY: Wildland firefighters often use phrases and words unfamiliar to the general public. This glossary is intended to help people better understand the terminology used by fire crews and in news reports.
Aerial Fuels: All live and dead vegetation in the forest canopy or above surface fuels, including tree branches, twigs and cones, snags, moss, and high brush.
Air Tanker: A fixed-wing aircraft equipped to drop fire retardants or suppressants. Tankers are often referred to by their plane model type, such as the DC-10 Air Tanker.
Agency: Any federal, state, or local organization participating with jurisdictional responsibilities.
Backfire: A fire set along the inner edge of a fireline to consume the fuel in the path of a wildfire and/or change the direction of force of the fire's convection column. Historically used by Native American tribes that lived on the plains.
Blow-up: A sudden increase in fire intensity or rate of spread strong enough to prevent direct control or to upset control plans. Unlike a flare-up, a blow-up generally indicates a significant, large change to the fire landscape.
Brush: A collective term that refers to stands of vegetation dominated by shrubby, woody plants, or low-growing trees, usually of a type undesirable for livestock or timber management.
Brush Fire: A fire burning in vegetation that is predominantly shrubs, brush and scrub growth.
Bucket Drops: The dropping of fire retardants or water from specially designed buckets slung below a helicopter.
Buffer Zones: An area of reduced vegetation, natural or manmade, that separates wildlands from vulnerable residential or business developments.
Burn Out: Setting fire inside a control line to widen it or consume fuel between the edge of the fire and the control line.
Burning Conditions: The state of the combined factors of the environment that affect fire behavior in a specified fuel type.
Burning Period: That part of each 24-hour period when fires spread most rapidly, typically from 10:00 a.m. to sundown.
Candle or Candling: A single tree or a very small clump of trees which is burning from the bottom up.
Command Staff: The command staff consists of the information officer, safety officer and liaison officer. They report directly to the incident commander and may have assistants.
Complex: Two or more individual incidents located in the same general area which are assigned to a single incident commander or unified command.
Control Line: Built or natural fire barriers and treated fire edge used to control a fire.
Cooperating Agency: An agency supplying assistance other than direct suppression, rescue, support, or service functions to the incident control effort.
Crown Fire (Crowning): The movement of fire through the crowns of trees or shrubs more or less independently of the surface fire.
Dead Fuels: Fuels with no living tissue in which moisture is roughly equal to or less than the air.
Debris Burning: A fire originally set for the purpose of clearing land or for rubbish, garbage or meadow burning.
Defensible Space: An area either natural or manmade where material capable of causing a fire to spread has been treated, cleared, reduced, or changed to act as a barrier between an advancing wildland fire and the loss to life, property, or resources.
Direct Attack: When fire crews work to suppress or alter a fire by wetting, smothering, or chemically(fuel retardant) quenching the fire or by physically separating burning from unburned fuel.
Division: Divisions are used to divide an incident into geographical areas of operation. Divisions are established when the number of resources exceeds the span-of-control of the operations chief. A division is located with the Incident Command System organization between the branch and the task force/strike team.
Duff: The layer of decomposing organic materials lying below the litter layer of freshly fallen twigs, needles, and leaves and immediately above the mineral soil.
Engine: Any ground vehicle providing specified levels of pumping, water and hose capacity.
Engine Crew: Firefighters assigned to an engine. The Fireline Handbook defines the minimum crew makeup by engine type.
Escape Route: A preplanned and understood route firefighters take to move to a safety zone or other low-risk area, such as an already burned area, previously constructed safety area, a meadow that won't burn, natural rocky area that is large enough to take refuge without being burned.
Extreme Fire Behavior: "Extreme" implies a level of fire behavior characteristics that ordinarily precludes methods of direct control action. One of more of the following is usually involved: high rate of spread, prolific crowning and/or spotting, presence of fire whirls, strong convection column.
Fine (Light) Fuels: Fast-drying fuels, generally with a comparatively high surface area-to-volume ratio, which are less than 1/4-inch in diameter and have a timelag of one hour or less. These fuels readily ignite and are rapidly consumed by fire when dry.
Fingers of a Fire: The long narrow extensions of a fire projecting from the main body.
Fire Behavior: The manner in which a fire reacts to the influences of fuel, weather and topography.
Fire Break: A natural or constructed barrier used to stop or check fires that may occur, or to provide a control line from which to work.
Fire Crew: An organized group of firefighters under the leadership of a crew leader or other designated official.
Fire Front: The part of a fire within which continuous flaming combustion is taking place. Unless otherwise specified the fire front is assumed to be the leading edge of the fire perimeter. In ground fires, the fire front may be mainly smoldering combustion.
Fire Intensity: A general term relating to the heat energy released by a fire.
Fire Line: A linear fire barrier that is scraped or dug to mineral soil.
Fire Load: The number and size of fires historically experienced on a specified unit over a specified period (usually one day) at a specified index of fire danger.
Fire Perimeter: The entire outer edge or boundary of a fire.
Fire Storm: Violent convection caused by a large continuous area of intense fire. Often characterized by destructively violent surface indrafts, near and beyond the perimeter, and sometimes by tornado-like whirls.
Fire Triangle: Instructional aid in which the sides of a triangle are used to represent the three factors (oxygen, heat, fuel) necessary for combustion and flame production; removal of any of the three factors causes flame production to cease.
Firefighting Resources: All people and major items of equipment that can or potentially could be assigned to fires.
Flanks of a Fire: The parts of a fire's perimeter that are roughly parallel to the main direction of spread.
Flare-up: Any sudden acceleration of fire spread or intensification of a fire. Flare-up lasts a relatively short time and does not radically change control plans.
Flash Fuels: Fuels such as grass, leaves, draped pine needles, fern, tree moss and some kinds of slash, that ignite readily and are consumed rapidly when dry. Also called fine fuels.
Fuel: Combustible material. Includes, vegetation, such as grass, leaves, ground litter, plants, shrubs and trees, that feed a fire.
Fuel Loading: The amount of fuel present expressed quantitatively in terms of weight of fuel per unit area.
Fuel Reduction: Manipulation, including combustion, or removal of fuels to reduce the likelihood of ignition and/or to lessen potential damage and resistance to control.
Fuel Type: An identifiable association of fuel elements of a distinctive plant species, form, size, arrangement, or other characteristics that will cause a predictable rate of fire spread or difficulty of control under specified weather conditions.
Ground Fuel: All combustible materials below the surface litter, including duff, tree or shrub roots, punchy wood, peat, and sawdust, that normally support a glowing combustion without flame.
Hand Line: A fireline built with hand tools.
Head of a Fire: The side of the fire having the fastest rate of spread.
Heavy Fuels: Fuels of large diameter such as snags, logs, large limb wood, that ignite and are consumed more slowly than flash fuels.
Helibase: The main location within the general incident area for parking, fueling, maintaining, and loading helicopters. The helibase is usually located at or near the incident base.
Helispot: A temporary landing spot for helicopters.
Helitack: The use of helicopters to transport crews, equipment, and fire retardants or suppressants to the fire line during the initial stages of a fire.
Hose Lay: Arrangement of connected lengths of fire hose and accessories on the ground, beginning at the first pumping unit and ending at the point of water delivery.
Hotshot Crew: A highly trained fire crew used mainly to build fireline by hand.
Hotspot: A particularly active part of a fire.
Hotspotting: Reducing or stopping the spread of fire at points of a particularly rapid rate of spread or special threat, generally the first step in prompt control, with emphasis on first priorities.
Incident: A human-caused or natural occurrence, such as wildland fire, that requires emergency service action to prevent or reduce the loss of life or damage to property or natural resources.
Incident Command Post (ICP): Location at which primary command functions are executed. The ICP may be co-located with the incident base or other incident facilities.
Incident Commander: Individual responsible for the management of all incident operations at the incident site.
Incident Management Team: The incident commander and appropriate general or command staff personnel assigned to manage an incident.
Initial Attack: The actions taken by the first resources to arrive at a wildfire to protect lives and property, and prevent further extension of the fire.
Jump Spot: Selected landing area for smokejumpers.
Knock Down: To reduce the flame or heat on the more vigorously burning parts of a fire edge.
Ladder Fuels: Fuels that provide vertical continuity between strata, thereby allowing fire to carry from surface fuels into the crowns of trees or shrubs with relative ease. They help initiate and assure the continuation of crowning.
Live Fuels: Living plants, such as trees, grasses, and shrubs, in which the seasonal moisture content cycle is controlled largely by internal physiological mechanisms, rather than by external weather influences.
Mobilization: The process and procedures used by all organizations, federal, state and local for activating, assembling, and transporting all resources that have been requested to respond to or support an incident.
Mop-up: To make a fire safe or reduce residual smoke after the fire has been controlled by extinguishing or removing burning material along or near the control line, felling snags, or moving logs so they won't roll downhill.
Mutual Aid Agreement: Written agreement between agencies and/or jurisdictions in which they agree to assist one another upon request, by furnishing personnel and equipment.
Nomex: Trade name for a fire-resistant synthetic material used in the manufacturing of flight suits and pants and shirts used by firefighters and reporters covering wildland fires.
Operational Period: The period of time scheduled for execution of a given set of tactical actions as specified in the Incident Action Plan. Operational periods can be of various lengths, although usually not more than 24 hours.
Peak Fire Season: That period of the fire season during which fires are expected to ignite most readily, to burn with greater than average intensity, and to create damages at an unacceptable level.
Prescribed Fire: Any fire ignited by management actions under certain, predetermined conditions to meet specific objectives related to hazardous fuels or habitat improvement.
Rate of Spread: The relative activity of a fire in extending its horizontal dimensions.
Red Flag Warning: Term used by fire weather forecasters to alert forecast users to an ongoing or imminent critical fire weather pattern.
Rehabilitation: The activities necessary to repair damage or disturbance caused by wildland fires or the fire suppression activity.
Relative Humidity (Rh): The ratio of the amount of moisture in the air, to the maximum amount of moisture that air would contain if it were saturated. The ratio of the actual vapor pressure to the saturated vapor pressure.
Resources: 1) Personnel, equipment, services and supplies available, or potentially available, for assignment to incidents. 2) The natural resources of an area, such as timber, crass, watershed values, recreation values, and wildlife habitat.
Retardant: A substance or chemical agent which reduced the flammability of combustibles.
Run (of a fire): The rapid advance of the head of a fire with a marked change in fire line intensity and rate of spread from that noted before and after the advance.
Running: A rapidly spreading surface fire with a well-defined head.
Scratch Line: An unfinished preliminary fire line hastily established or built as an emergency measure to check the spread of fire.
Slash: Debris left after logging, pruning, thinning or brush cutting; includes logs, chips, bark, branches, stumps and broken understory trees or brush.
Smokejumper: A firefighter who travels to fires by aircraft and parachute.
Smoldering Fire: A fire burning without flame and barely spreading.
Snag: A standing dead tree or part of a dead tree from which at least the smaller branches have fallen.
Spot Fire: A fire ignited outside the perimeter of the main fire by flying sparks or embers.
Structure Fire: Fire originating in and burning any part or all of any building, shelter, or other structure.
Surface Fuels: Loose surface litter on the soil surface, normally consisting of fallen leaves or needles, grass, twigs, bark, cones and small branches.
Torching: The ignition and flare-up of a tree or small group of trees, usually from bottom to top.
Uncontrolled Fire: Any fire which threatens to destroy life, property, or natural resources.
Volunteer Fire Department (VFD): A fire department of which some or all members are unpaid.
Water Tender: A ground vehicle capable of transporting specified quantities of water.
Wildland Fire: Any nonstructure fire, other than prescribed fire, that occurs in the wildland.
Wildland Urban Interface: The line, area or zone where structures and other human development meet or intermingle with undeveloped wildland or vegetative fuels.
