California Fire News

Sunday, January 13, 2008

California Fire News

Links for 2008-01-12 [del.icio.us]

Posted: 13 Jan 2008 12:00 AM CST

LA Times - Photo essay of Santiago Fire burnover
Photo essay of Santiago Fire burnover

USFS: Contempt of court- Mark Rey - Jail?

Posted: 12 Jan 2008 01:37 PM CST

United States Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey facing time in the slammer? Facing accusations of Contempt of court, and circumventing the law.

Federal Court challenges the agency on the use of Fire retardant for wildfire suppression.

"The apparent pattern suggests a strategy of looking for ways to avoid the law's mandate as opposed to looking for a means of complying with the law."
Contempt of court for a "duplicitous" strategy of skirting the law
"The Forest Service had no real intention to comply with the law or the court's orders."
Forest Service maintained that it did not report on what might happen to fish if fire retardant was accidentally dropped in streams because it did not intend to drop fire retardant in streams

Federal judge Judge Donald Mollo in Montana said Friday he's prepared to hold the U.S. Forest Service in contempt of court for a "duplicitous" strategy of skirting the law so it can keep fighting wildfires with retardant that kills fish.

"The Forest Service, throughout these proceedings, evidenced a strategy of circumventing, rather than complying with," the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act, he wrote. "The apparent pattern suggests a strategy of looking for ways to avoid the law's mandate as opposed to looking for a means of complying with the law."

Judge Donald Molloy set a Feb. 26 hearing in U.S. District Court in Missoula to give the Forest Service a chance to argue that Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey should not be put in jail and that fire retardant drops from aircraft should not be stopped until the agency properly considers the danger to the environment.

Potential penalities include sending Rey to jail, putting him under house arrest and banning the Forest Service from using any fire retardants but water in air tankers, Molloy wrote.

In an earlier order, Molloy wrote that Rey, who oversees the Forest Service, should appear in person.

"We take very seriously our obligations to perform the environmental analysis required by law, and have made every effort to comply with the court's rulings in this case," Forest Service spokesman Joe Walsh said. "We expect to demonstrate the government's good faith in further proceedings before the court."

In 2005, Molloy ruled that the Forest Service violated the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act when it failed to go through a public process to analyze the potential harm from using ammonium phosphate, a fertilizer that kills fish, as the primary ingredient for retardant.

The ruling stemmed from a lawsuit brought by Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics (www.fseee.org/) after fire retardant dropped in Fall Creek in Central Oregon in 2002 killed 20,000 fish.

Andy Stahl, executive director of the Eugene-based group, said the government's use of fire retardant is like the use of pesticides, polluting watersheds and killing fish and wildlife.

"The Forest Service view is, 'Whatever the harm to the environment, it's irrelevant, because we are fighting a war, and fire must be worse than anything we are doing to fight a fire,' " Stahl said. "That's not true.

Most of our Western forests need fire to stay healthy. It's been the overzealous war on fire that's been the underlying cause of our forest health crisis."

On Sept. 20, NOAA Fisheries told the Forest Service that dropping poisonous fire retardant on wildfires was likely to jeopardize the survival of 26 species of salmon and other fish, and would destroy or harm critical habitat.

The so-called jeopardy finding cited harm to more species than any other jeopardy finding in the history of the Endangered Species Act, Stahl said.

SAR - Green Valley Lake - Search Continues - Road Closures

Posted: 12 Jan 2008 11:49 AM CST

San Bernardino Sheriff office Press Release -

Effective January 12, 2008 at 0600 a.m. the US Forest Service in Green Valley Lake will be closing fire roads 3N16 (Crab Flats Road) from Green Valley Lake Road to 3N14 (Big Pine Flats) and 2N13 (Snow Slide Road) will be closed from Green Valley Lake Campground to 3N14 at Fawnskin.
The National Forest Land within the designated road closure areas is also closed. The roads will reopen on Monday, January 21st, 2008.
In the addition to the fire road closures Green Valley Lake Road will be closed at 3N16 (Crab Flats Road).
Residents of the area will be the only persons allowed through the road closure. The road will reopen on Sunday, January 13th at 6:00 p.m.
The road closures are necessary to limit the amount of traffic in the Green Valley Lake area.

The search for Mr. Christy is continuing and there are over 100 volunteers expected to assit with the search Saturday, January 12, 2008. The weather continued to be sunny, warm and clear throughout the day.
Two airships were able to conduct aerial searches and assist the ground operation by inserting teams into their designated search areas.
The search will continue throughout the night with a small group of volunteers. The search will continue tomorrow morning. Volunteers from Contra Costa County, Bay Area Search and Rescue from Marin and San Mateo, Riverside County, Los Angeles County, Ventura County and the National Ski Patrol from both Northern and Southern California will continue to assist in the search efforts.
Friday, January 11, 2008 11:00 a.m. - The search and rescue operation continues in the isolated area north and east of the Green Valley Lake Campground. With approximately 40 search volunteers today, they are encouraged to continue to search under the huge boulders and dig if necessary, as Mr. Christy may have created a shelter from the weather.
The ground search teams have covered a 20-30 mile radius from the campground and a 100 mile radius has been covered from the air.
Approximately 100 volunteers outside of San Bernardino County have assisted with the search. The National Ski Patrol plans to bring an Avalanche Trained Dog to the search on Saturday, January 12th.
Search coordinators expect about 100 volunteers to assist on Saturday.
MANY THANKS TO ALL OF THE VOLUNTEERS FOR THEIR HARD WORK!