Hacker News Reader

Comment by okareaman | Hacker News Reader

At least we saw it coming and made some preparations. I think climate change is a massive problem but we can't put it all on climate change because droughts are part of California history and we can put some of the blame on forest management practices.

100 million dead trees in the Sierra are a massive risk for unpredictable wildfires

https://news.berkeley.edu/2018/01/18/sierra-wildfire-risk/

Fire Suppression — And Climate Change — Is To Blame For California’s Megafires

https://www.capradio.org/articles/2020/09/12/fire-suppressio...

View on HN

These extreme fire events extend across the entire Northern hemisphere right now (Oregon, Washington, Montana, Greece, Turkey, Siberia etc.). Blaming California specific forest management practices is disingenuous at best.

How does the fires being common across the region absolve California of the accusation of mismanagement? Isn't that more damning?

Calling "the entire northern hemisphere" a "region" is a bit of a stretch; GP is presumably referring to the summer season (which is not shared by the southern hemisphere at this time), not proximity to California.

They are mainly Federal lands and so it is mainly Federal policy and practice that would be to blame in the US for that aspect of the causes. But the most obvious international common denominator is hotter, drier, windier weather - although I would not be surprised if many countries have similar "modern" responses to forest fires.

Forest management is bad overall, who will pay for it? In US/Canada the heat dome made for extreme weather. In Europe, record heat and rainfall causing extreme floods. We're having both, bad mitigation and climate catastrophe, going on. Plus Covid, pretty much following Hopi prophecies.

There are two problems that required to Solutions. Many of the areas that are burning now had a burn interval I'm less than 5 years prior to Federal wildfire suppression. They haven't burned in the last 150 years because of this. This is a real problem that needs to be addressed on top of climate change.

It's not just one or the other? Who knew things were complex and sometimes didn't align with one political ideology?

Like many things, the "blame pie" chart contains multiple reasons and no solutions.

I remember how it was a huge deal for weeks when our former president said something along these lines but to a large extent the administration was correct.

I hate the fact that these changes to forestry management are going to be delayed or shot down just because of partisan bullshit. I’d say we’re better than this but I’m not quite sure nowadays.

Most of California’s forests are managed by the Interior Department. Why wasn’t federal forest policy changed if the last administration believed that was the primary cause of fires?

Maybe the areas affected don't actually benefit anyone in power? Probably not enough graft coming out of the timber industry.

I think Interior tends to defer to state and local interests rather than following national policies.

That’s not how it works. This is, literally, land owned and managed by the federal government. It’s on them to manage it.

The former president was very inarticulate about it, which I'd say was the problem. He told us California residents that we needed to sweep our forests and didn't acknowledge that the majority of the public forests were the responsibility of the Federal Govt. A more knowledgeable Republican president could have made a better case that wouldn't get ridiculed.

Trump blames California for wildfires, tells state 'you gotta clean your floors'

https://www.politico.com/states/california/story/2020/08/20/...

Trump's suggestions have prompted head-scratching from experts who say his prescriptions — more raking, less water released into the ocean for environmental purposes — suggest he does not understand the science of wildfires. Critics also point out that most of California’s wildlands are federally managed.

Okay, now that he’s gone who do we pin the blame on?

The post you are replying to did not blame Trump for the fires, it said he was incoherent and incorrect in assigning blame. He continues to do both of those things in his role of King of the GOP, so there's no reason to stop pinning blame on him for things he is doing.

Thank you. I sometimes wonder if it is that I don't write clearly enough or if some people have poor reading comprehension. Perhaps both.

Ad hominem attacks aside, the question remains. Now that #OrangeManBad isn't here, who, exactly is,as you say, "the problem"? From what I've seen, Californians have a bad habit of electing people who can't accomplish anything, and then blame their woes on people who are so far removed from being able to have any influence that it's laughable. The forestry service under Trump is the same forestry service that logged (pardon the pun) eight years under Obama. What did Obama do to mitigate the fires? The Dixie fire continues to burn without restrainnt, what's the solution? Frankly, as much as I don't like the man, Trump is right - when it comes to forest fires in CA, it's kind of your mess to clean up. Drive down any road on the coast and you'll find acres of arroyos full to the brim with deadwood - literal tinderboxes that nobody is cleaning up. Okay, 50x% of the forests belong to the Federal Government? Cool, don't build your houses within a half mile firebreak of them. The other 50%? Well, gosh, I guess you all should have a chat or something.

Let’s see, most of the giant fires, Shasta Trinity, Mendocino, Six Rivers, Lassen, Plumas are all National Forests. Lassen National Park, part of the Dixie fire.

I guess these people think Newsom was/is President or do not understand the difference between county, state and federal jurisdiction.

Not totally; they are intermingled with privately held land.

Can you honestly say that any president really understands the science of wildfires (or anything else -- perhaps Jimmy Carter excepted, he did understand the science of nuclear reactors).

Probably not, which is why all but one of them tended to defer to hired experts on many issues instead of spouting the first thing that popped into their head.

This is been a problem a hundred years plus in the making. You can't blame just one president

Here's a great talk from a Forest Service expert on why wildfires have become worse. The TLDR is that forests have become much denser, particularly after old trees were logged, and this creates large areas of fuel. Additionally, forests need active management - prescribed burns, dry fuel cleanup, pest management, etc. Climate change may be aggravating or amplifying the intensity of wildfires but there are other causes that are potentially more important, and they present opportunities for wildfire prevention that are currently ignored by governments/news media/social media.

https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_hessburg_why_wildfires_have_g...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com