IDAHO FALLS – State and federal land management agencies have put fire restrictions in place for all of eastern Idaho as it enters the heart of wildfire season.
The Eastern Idaho Interagency Fire Center, which coordinates resource sharing between multiple agencies and dozens of local fire departments to battle wildland fires, said in a news release that Stage 1 fire restrictions would go into effect Thursday, Aug. 7. You can learn more about the fire restrictions by using the Idaho Department of Lands restriction map.
“Right now, we are in such dry conditions that if a fire gets away from you, you are going to end up paying for it,” said State Fire Warden Kelly Hoffer of the Idaho Department of Lands.
Under Stage 1, these restrictions have been put in place, according to the fire center:
- Building, maintaining, attending, or using a fire, campfire or stove fire except within a designated recreation site and in a permanent concrete or metal fire ring, or on private land, and only within an owner-provided structure.
- Smoking, except within an enclosed vehicle, building or designated recreation site, or while stopped in an area at least 3 feet in diameter that is barren or cleared of all flammable materials.
Exemptions include:
- Persons with a written permit that specifically authorizes the otherwise prohibited act.
- Persons using fire fueled solely by liquid petroleum or liquid petroleum gas (LPG) fuels. Such devices, including propane campfires, may be used only in an area cleared of flammable material.
- Persons conducting activities in those designated areas where the activity is specifically authorized by written posted notice.
- Any federal, state or local officer or member of an organized rescue or firefighting force in the performance of an official duty.
- All land within a city boundary is exempted.
- Other exemptions unique to each agency.
Various counties in eastern Idaho have also put fire bans in place.
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According to Audra Moore, a meteorologist with National Weather Service’s Pocatello office, temperatures have not been at record-breaking levels this summer, but they have been hotter than average. Over the months of May, June and July, the average temperature was 1 to 3 degrees above average for Pocatello, and 2 to 4 degrees above average for Idaho Falls.
Both Pocatello and Idaho Falls have been drier than normal this summer as well, Moore said. Pocatello has experienced .43 inches of precipitation below normal, while Idaho Falls has experienced 1.1 inches below normal.
“When it is hot and it is dry and it is windy, it just dries out those fuels more than anything else. It really helps those grasses and those shrubs get crispy even faster than normal sometimes,” Moore said. “We’re kind of getting into the heart of fire season right now, and it is dry and it’s hot.”
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This year’s fire season has already seen a variety of large wildfires break out. Some of the largest have been the Garden Creek Fire in early July, which burned over 5,000 acres on the Fort Hall Reservation, and the Grassy Fire, which burned over 2,000 acres north of the St. Anthony Sand Dunes.
Chris Burger, mitigation trespass specialist with BLM’s Idaho Falls District, said these fire restrictions have been put in place because the danger of a wildfire breaking out is simply too great right now.
“This is being done because our fuels are exceptionally dry, and the potential for a wildfire is quite high, and the potential for it to get large and cover a lot of the landscape before we can get around it and get it contained is also, as a result, high,” Burger said.
Hoffer, the fire warden, stressed how important it is for people to understand that these fire restrictions have not been put in place to limit people’s recreating opportunities, but to protect them and the land.
“We’re all stewards of the land. If you’re an outdoorsman, you’re a steward of the land. … (The restrictions) are to maintain that beauty, that pristine value that we have (with) the landscape that we live in,” Hoffer said.
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