Elite firefighters adjust to long season
Hotter, drier conditions alter strategy, they say
ANDERSON, California — Exhausted and hungry, some 12,000 firefighters are working 24-hour shifts battling deadly California wildfires and becoming resigned to fire seasons that start earlier, burn longer and unleash increasingly unpredictable blazes.
“There’s a lot going on up here, endless fires, and they’re all characteristically pretty much the same — windy, hot and dry,” firefighter James Sweeney said before heading out for a meal and a nap.
Sweeney, from St. Petersburg, Florida, is part of a team of highly trained wildland firefighters who battle the fiercest blazes in the country.
Weary after more than a day on the fire lines, the 43-year-old said that when his Gila, New Mexico-based crew leaves California, he expects to go north to Oregon, where new fires are kicking up.
Crews made progress this weekend on the Carr Fire near Redding, but it was still threatening thousands of homes and was not expected to be fully contained until mid-august at the earliest.
For many of the firefighters, the nonstop effort has become routine.
Last year, a fast-moving series of fires in Santa Rosa and elsewhere in Northern California killed 44 people and destroyed more than 8,000 structures. December’s Thomas Fire near Santa Barbara burned almost 282,000 acres, becoming the largest wildfire in California history.
In his 19 years on the job, Cal Fire Capt. Chris Anthony said, the most significant change is that hotter, drier conditions now mean that firefighters are trained to take a “tactical pause” to reconsider before charging in against the flames.
“Fire has become a lot more unpredictable,” he said. “In the past we could plan, but these days a fire can take a sudden and deadly turn.”