Discovery
US to end large timber sales: The Biden administration said that it is ending large-scale, old-growth timber sales in the country’s largest national forest - the Tongass National Forest in Alaska - and will focus on forest restoration, recreation and other noncommercial uses.
The US Agriculture Department, which includes the Forest Service, also said it will take steps to reverse a Trump administration decision last year to lift restrictions on logging and road-building in the southeast Alaska rainforest, which provides habitat for wolves, bears and salmon.
A 2001 rule prohibits road construction and timber harvests with limited exceptions on nearly one-third of national forest land. The Trump administration moved to exempt the Tongass from those prohibitions, something Alaska political leaders had sought for years.
Restoring those protections in the Tongass would return “stability and certainty to the conservation of 9.3 million acres of the world’s largest temperate old growth rainforest,” the Agriculture Department said. It expects to initiate a rulemaking process next month that will include a chance for public comment, Forest Service spokesperson Larry Moore said.
Randi Spivak, public lands program director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said old-growth trees are “carbonstoring champions” and shade salmon streams in the Tongass. (AP)
Ohio towns expand events: A threeday celebration of what would have been history-making astronaut John Glenn’s 100th birthday began Friday in his birthplace and childhood hometown in Ohio, even as additional events were announced to mark the occasion.
Glenn, who died in 2016, was the first American to orbit Earth, making him a national hero in 1962. In addition to his military and space accomplishments, he spent 24 years as a Democrat in the US Senate.
The John Glenn Centennial Celebration in both Cambridge, where Glenn was born on July 18, 1921, and nearby New Concord, where he grew up and met his late wife, Annie, runs through Sunday. It includes a parade, the Friendship 7-Miler road race named for his famous aircraft, lectures, museum tours, space movies, biplane and rocket car rides, music and children’s science activities.
At Ohio State University, the John Glenn College of Public Affairs has updated seven display cases in Page Hall in honor of Glenn’s life, legacy of public service and relationship to the university, which houses Glenn’s archives. Items displayed include speeches, letters, diaries and news clippings. The college plans additional events throughout the year. (AP)
Lightning likely cause of fire:
A lightning strike likely ignited a 2020 wildfire in California’s Sierra National Forest, but the US Forest Service said Friday they could not determine an official cause of the fire.
September’s Creek Fire burned 600 square miles (1,500 square kilometers) and spread so quickly that hundreds of Labor Day holiday campers had to be rescued by a series of harrowing helicopter flights. All 214 campers were delivered safely.
Investigators did not rule out arson and lit cigarettes as the cause, but said there were no illegal marijuana grow sites nearby that could have started the fire. Forest service officials said an “undetermined” status is not uncommon with a fire this complex.
Fresno County Supervisor Nathan Magsig expressed gratitude for the service completing its investigation but said an undetermined cause makes it “hard for the residents and those who lost so much to find closure.” (AP)