Danger remains for some areas in the Lake Fire aftermath
With drastic improvements made to the Lake Fire it is now time to focus on recovery.
That’s where the forest service’s Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) teams come in.
Experts said even when the fire is out and crews have gone home, that doesn’t mean the danger is over.
“Our overall objective is to identify where public safety, property, could be affected and identify what, if anything, we could do to prevent impacts. And our goal is to do that within the first year following the fire,” BAER team soil scientist Eric Schroder said.
The biggest problem after a wildfire — flooding and mudslides.
“After the burn, especially in the higher burn areas, you don’t have the leaves, the needles breaking up that rainfall, you have hydrophobic soil, so not all of the water gets absorbed into the soil,” said Chris Stewart, a hydrologist with the Forest Service.
That means there is nothing to prevent the soil from sliding.
Scientists are now working to identify the areas most at risk to people and natural resources.
BAER team members said around one to two years after the fire is when the forest is at greater risk of floods and soil erosion. But with the current weather conditions, those years could be extended if the drought remains.
“The recovery depends on the rainfall we get. If we stay in a drought and you don’t get the vegetation and the recovery it will take longer for the risk to decrease,” Stewart said.
Experts said in the past this area is prone to severe flooding even with vegetation to absorb most of the rain fall.
But with nothing left in the burn area there’s an even greater risk for disaster.
“We want to get the point across that in certain areas from the fire the risk is higher because the watershed is going to respond differently now that there’s been a fire from before,” BAER coordinator Robert Taylor said.
This team hopes to present their recommendations to the forest managers by next Tuesday.
From there it will be up to them to decide whether to let nature take it’s course or intervene.
In the meantime, it will be years before we see the forest return to its pre-fire beauty.
