The Reserve Ranger District of the Gila National Forest began a prescribed fire on Tuesday at the southwestern part of the state – despite a red flag warning that takes effect Wednesday for that quadrant of New Mexico.
The burn southeast of Apache Creek is one of two scheduled for this week, with the second at the Sheep Basin Unit, south of Reserve.
The firefighter workers in the area told the agency that operations looked normal and they would assess Wednesday morning whether they will continue by conducting a test burn.
A new state law prohibits prescribed burns during red flag events when high winds and low humidity increase fire danger. But U.S. Forest Service spokesperson Maribeth Pecotte told KUNM that as a federal agency, the state law does not apply. A spokesperson gave a similar statement to KRQE in April. The law was passed specifically in response to prescribed burns by the Forest Service last year that got out of control and became the biggest wildfire in state history.
Since then, the agency says it doubled the amount of resources by appointing burn bosses, having firefighters on standby at the edge of fires, and providing more equipment.
Without regular prescribed burns, officials say the pine forest gets overgrown which could create a more catastrophic fire.
Pecotte says the recent initiative of bringing in firefighters from outside the state to help with fires has been beneficial.
"They asked different questions because they weren't so familiar with the landscape. And they helped everybody see the big picture a little bit better," she said.
Meanwhile a lightning-caused fire remains zero percent contained. The Pass Fire began on May 17th due to a lightning strike near the Black Range District, 40 miles west of Winston. Although it has burned over 10,000 acres right now, Pecotte says the burn may be beneficial.
"We feel like this area really could benefit from having a little bit of fire coming through it, it could consume those large logs and other fuels that can contribute to a worse fire later."
The U.S. Forest Service does have prescribed burns scheduled into the summer for New Mexico.
UPDATE:
Due to high winds, the U.S. Forest Service did not conduct a scheduled prescribed burn on Wednesday May 31, 2023 at either the Cold Springs unit or the Sheep Basin unit.
A spokesperson wrote in an email: “We did not intend on lighting today based on the forecasted weather from the previous several days that let us know we would be in critical fire conditions on 5/31. With this information yesterday we made tactical decisions to complete all ignition by end of shift 5/30 thus allowing us to burn any interior pockets of fuel up that could have potentially reignited on their own during red flag conditions causing containment problems and also enabling us to focus all resources on scene to secure and hold throughout the red flag conditions on 5/31.”
The fire crews are patrolling, monitoring, and mopping up heat sources near the perimeter of the Cold Springs unit today and are expected to continue with the prescribed burn again tomorrow.
The original headline was edited to reflect the Forest Service started the burn the day before a red flag warning took effect.
Support for this coverage comes from the Thornburg Foundation and KUNM listeners.
