Workshop aims to reduce forest fire risk

Mystic — In a year when Connecticut has seen a 20 percent increase in the number of forest fires statewide, firefighters and emergency responders from throughout the northeast Atlantic region gathered to focus on better prevention and suppression of woodland wildfires.

The workshop, which began Tuesday, brings together about 80 firefighters and forest fire experts from Atlantic Canada, New England and seven Mid-Atlantic States for three days at the Mystic Hilton. Images of Smokey Bear, the mascot of fire prevention and education efforts since the 1940s, were displayed throughout the gathering on posters, patches and other paraphernalia.

Richard Schenk, fire control officer with the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, said the conference will help him and his crew improve their efforts to better understand the problem of forest fires, as well as ways to engage the public in prevention efforts.

Because of dry conditions in the state’s forests — which cover about 60 percent of Connecticut — there have been about 500 to 600 forest fires statewide this year, he said, “about 20 percent above normal.” One of these, in Cornwall, began in mid-September and is “still smoldering,” he added.

The infestation by gypsy moths this year also made the state’s forests more susceptible to fires, he said. “The trees get stressed by defoliation, and the sun beats in and dries the forest.”

He and speakers at the workshop emphasized that the majority of fires are caused by humans, either accidentally or intentionally.

Mike Stambaugh, associate research professor in the University of Missouri Tree Rings Laboratory, explained how his research of forest fire history can help current firefighters understand the risk for fires in

particular areas. Stambaugh analyzes scars and rings from sections of tree stumps and living trees left by fires to establish what year and season a fire started.

“Tree rings describe the potential for the rate of fires at different sites,” he said.

Changing climate conditions also are factored into his research. Because of climate change and the abundance of trees that provide fuel for fires, he said, the probability of forest fires is increasing.

Maureen Brooks, cooperative fire specialist for the Northeastern Area of the U.S. Forest Service, urged that communities develop plans to assess and reduce their fire risk.

The recent wildfire in Gatlinburg, Tenn., which claimed 14 lives, and the fires last spring in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania could have happened in many other communities, she said.

“No community in this country should think they’re immune from the kind of fires seen in Tennessee and Pennsylvania last spring,” she said.