A potent fire eases, and a community is grateful

The Medio Fire is close to becoming history — with firefighters saying the blaze should be wrapped up this weekend. For the past two weeks, firefighters from the Southwest Area Incident Management Team have spent hours battling the blaze, which at one time threatened homes and buildings, along with igniting more than 3,680 acres of forest.

Flames and smoke from the fire filled the sky for days, increasing the intensity of sunrises and sunsets but making it difficult for people to breathe.

A lightning strike caused the blaze, just another reminder that anticipated monsoon storms did not arrive to relieve the parched lands, as we New Mexicans expect every summer. The season lasts until the end of September, and we all hope rainfall will help ease the dryness and bring relief to humans, beasts and vegetation.

So far this year, relief has been scant and lightning strikes potent. The combination of overgrowth, tinder-dry fuel and lack of moisture to quickly douse a strike-caused blaze are keeping the fire risk high.

With the Medio Fire, the lightning hit, caught and coursed through areas of Santa Fe National Forest near Nambe Pueblo. Residents of nearby communities wondered if they were going to have to grab emergency bags packed with clothes and precious items just in case the call came to evacuate. Thankfully, the call did not come, but the blaze reminds us that wildfires are a persistent risk in the West.

All those who live in that space between town and forest should take the fire as a warning. There is much that property owners can do to reduce their fire risk — everything from cutting brush, removing fuel near structures and placing wood piles away from buildings.

A community concern is the realization that roads in the area of the Medio Fire are barely large enough for fire vehicles to pass. An actual evacuation might be difficult to carry out because of narrow roads. County, tribal, state and federal leaders should seek to widen roads so that residents can get out in case of catastrophe.

These conditions are not going away, after all. Climate change has exacerbated conditions on the ground, with higher temperatures, decreasing moisture and overgrown forests all combining to create perfect conditions for more and hotter blazes.

Against those odds, the work of firefighters is most appreciated. These front-line responders use brawn and science to battle fire, both from the air and ground. In the case of the Medio Fire, rainfall helped, but so did the use of burn operations along the fire’s western edge to stop the blaze’s progress. Scars from the Pacheco Fire erected another barrier, as did the work of an earlier controlled burn — without fuel, the fire progress halted. The 240plus fire crew worked two weeks straight to beat the fire back. They have our gratitude.

By Tuesday, fire operations chief Buck Wickham expressed confidence that the worst was behind us. Communities were out of risk, and he believed the fire would be completely managed by the weekend.

Then will come the reckoning, the look at damage and even a few silver linings to examine. Archaeologists say the fire exposed historical features that had been covered by vegetation, including a bridge built in the 1930s. Tribal sites could have been affected, and of course, there is the loss of wild creatures and our precious forest. But as bad as it was, it could have been much, much worse. For that, we offer thanks.