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Ashland Preparing for Fire Season
Preparing for Fire Season
5/8/24
By David Runkel
With dead and dying trees being hauled away, new firefighting equipment on order, firefighters ready to report for duty, weed control inspections scheduled in the coming weeks and a new emergency management director coordinating evacuation planning, the city of Ashland and its regional partners are getting ready for the June 1 beginning of fire season.
How serious will it be this year? That’s impossible to predict, but Fire Chief Ralph Sartain told City Council at Monday’s Study Session that the corridor from Roseburg to Redding may be in “better water” shape than areas to the north and east of us.
To date, 56 truck loads of logs have been sent to a Yreka lumber mill bringing in $141,800 in revenue and 40 yards of smaller pieces of timber have been donated to the Jackson County Fuel Committee. The tree removal work is due to move out of the Siskiyou Mountain Park area into the city watershed south of Lithia Park by the end of the week, Fire Marshall Mark Shay said.
Councilor Eric Hansen told Shay he was unhappy with delays in clearing the forests of dead and dying trees and doubted that tree removal work would be completed by the first of June as scheduled, allowing all trails in the watershed to be open. Shay said the helicopter picking up downed trees had been out of service for a week, due to a required Federal Aviation Administration inspection.
Shay also said city workers and volunteers will be going around the city to give advice on steps residents should take to reduce wildfire risk.
Chief Sartain said the city will receive two new heavy duty, off-road fire fighting engines in June, along with a new van style ambulance in July. This will allow for more personnel to be assigned to fire fighting, he told Council.
He also reviewed the status of fire fighting preparations by state and federal agencies. The US Forest Service will begin seven day a week staffing in June, Rogue River Hot Shot firefighters and Siskiyou rappellers will be available for duty in early June, a water tanker will be available June 4, the federal tanker base will be staffed June 1 and available for service across the county and eight incident management teams are in place covering the region.
Fire season has already arrived for the Bureau of Land Management, Sartain reported, which has put out 11 human-caused fires on BLM land this year. It will have a full staff of 50 in June, who will help remove 140 abandoned recreation vehicles. Meanwhile, ODF will have helicopters based in Medford and Grants Pass to help fight fires and has 17 detection cameras on line and five more alert wildfire cameras set up, Sartain reported.
Burns told Council that efforts are underway to ensure that Ashlanders know escape routes in case of fire. He urged people to make test runs so they don’t get confused in the event of an emergency.
It appears that “we are so much better prepared than ever before,” Mayor Tonya Graham said in concluding the briefing. She thanked staff working on reducing fire risk, and urged everyone in town to prepare “to get out of their homes safely.”
