Fire Resources
- 101 Fire Safety Websites
- FireWise: National Fire Protection Association
- FireWise:NFPA:Best Practices Guide
- Fire Adapted Communities
- Fire, Fuel, and Smoke Science
- Fire Safety Training Powerpoints
- U.S. Fire Administration: FEMA
- Wildfires: Are you Prepared?
- Wildlands, Wildfire and People: About this Report – “Fire has historically played a fundamental ecological role in many of America’s wildland areas. However, the rising number of homes in the wildland-urban interface (WUI), associated impacts on lives and property from wildfire, and escalating costs of wildfire management have led to an urgent need for communities to become “fire-adapted.” We present maps of the conterminous United States that illustrate historical natural fire regimes, the wildland-urban interface, and the number and location of structures burned since 1999. We outline a sampler of actions, programs, and community planning and development options to help decrease the risks of and damages from wildfire.”
A citizen in a burn area near Fort Collins, Colorado prepared an outstanding video that shows the effects of wildfires on flooding and water quality. This is the best video I have seen out of the High Park Burn Area in the Cache la Poudre River watershed.
To help you all understand our plight, the watershed is about 1,500 square miles of mountain terrain that provides drinking water and irrigation water for 500,000 citizens in Northern Colorado. Approximately 20% of the watershed was affected by this past summer’s wildfire, which lasted more than 1 month. When it rains, we cannot draw drinking water from the Poudre River.
The videographer is a resident in the High Park fire burn area, forester/resource analyst by trade. Brian K. Varrella, P.E., CFM, Floodplain Administrator, Fort Collins Utilities
