THE WARNER FIRE SALVAGE MANTRA: LIGHT IT, FIGHT IT, LOG IT

by Timothy Ingalsbee, Ph.D.

The Warner Creek Fire (1991), the Warner Fire Recovery Project (1991-1993), and (surprise!) the Warner Salvage Sale (1994?) provide a case study for the Forest Service's new modus operandi for salvage scams under Option 9. The agency's "forest health means fuel reduction for fire protection" ideology developed on the Warner Project will be applied to the massive thinning and salvage logging schemes planned for native forests throughout the West. In short, this sinister ploy is the system of Light it, Fight it, and Log it.

LIGHT IT

We might never have known the truth that Warner Creek Fire was started by arsonists if Forest Service law enforcement officers had not blurted out to the press details about the fire's origins. They stated that the fire was definitely intentionally-set, that the agency had numerous leads and physical evidence (i.e. incendiary devices), and that several fires had been set in the area over a 48 hour span. The officers further stated the agency suspected the Warner Creek Fire was started by the same arsonists who had been torching Eastside forests the previous four years. Indeed, there was not a moment's doubt that the Warner Creek Fire was ignited by arsonists.

After timber industry representatives fumed that "there was no evidence" that Warner Creek was started by arsonists, the Willamette Forest Supervisor made bizarre, absurd attempts to cover up the crime. First, he charged his public relations staff to call Warner Creek a "suspicious human-caused fire" (the agency's standard euphemism for arson). Second, he ordered that arson be excluded from the EIS analysis despite widespread public demand for it to be included as a significant issue. Third, he authorized false and deceptive language on the fire's origin to be published in the Draft EIS even though the fire investigator's final report had been handed to him three months earlier. This report stated conclusively that the Warner Creek fire was ignited by arsonists.

It was a full 14 months after the Warner Creek fire had been lit that the Supervisor was forced, under intense public pressure, to reveal the truth. He now claims that the fire's origin is irrelevant to his decision to salvage log. Meanwhile, arsonists continue to prey on Cascadia's forests, starting several arson fires this summer. Truth is the first casuality in warfare--and in wildfire--when the agency covers for arsonists.

FIGHT IT

Many environmental abuses occurred while fighting the Warner Creek Fire. Nearly eleven miles of dozerlines were carved into the Cornpatch Roadless Area. One of these new "cat" roads runs over a mile in length a mere fifty feet parallel to the Bunchgrass Ridge hiking trail. The agency's alleged reason for making a new cat-road instead of using the existing hiking trail for a fireline was its concern not to disturb archaeological sites along the trail corridor. Indeed, over 30 new sites were discovered after the fire. Nevertheless, proposed salvage units are now located on the ridgetop--one of these new clearcuts will be a half mile in length! (see photo p.3)--and logging will impact at least 7,800 feet of the trail. The dozerlines were never rehabilitated by the agency; hence, hundreds of trees lie "jackstrawed" where the bulldozer heaved them to the side (see photo p.2), creating a hideous visual scar and a severe fire hazard in the event of a reburn.

Firefighters were responsible for burning several thousand acres--an estimated 35% or more--of the total burned acreage in huge burnout and backfire operations. Firefighters had to pour hundreds of gallons of diesel fuel on the moist, moss-covered ground to get some of these burns going. Essentially, from start to finish, the Warner Creek Fire was an ongoing arson fire. Some of the areas that firefighters burned are now beautiful underburned green stands. Other areas burned hot; for example, along the ridgetop dozerline. Firefighters cut down hundreds of trees when the flames from their burnout started to "candlestick" (see photo p.3). Some of the areas deliberately burned by firefighters are now proposed salvage units! We must hold the agency's fire bosses accountable for their pyromaniacal actions.

LOG IT

Firefighters regularly had to do "the Three O' Clock Boogie," retreating from the firelines in the afternoon when the fire burned hottest. The areas that were most dangerous to fight fire were near existing plantations, where the dense thickets of even-aged "reprod" hurled the flames into adjacent old-growth canopies. These scorched old-growth stands are the very areas targeted for salvage logging. Like taking a jigsaw puzzle apart, piece by piece, the agency plans to add new clearcuts next to their old clearcuts, using stumps to mark the salvage unit boundaries (see photo p.2). The agency's rationale for clearcutting is to reduce fuel loads and to facilitate efficient fireline construction. The agency has in fact defined spotted owl habitat recovery in terms of fire control. It openly admits that it is "trading off" current and future owl habitat quality for its ability to fight wildfires.

Warner Creek has revealed the agency's new "ecosystems management" scheme of mimicking catastrophic fire disturbance to prevent catastrophic fire disturbance. Yet, the 28 plantations that were vaporized by the Warner Creek Fire had all been roaded, clearcut and slashburned. These "fuel reduction" activities did nothing to slow the flames, and in fact young "reprod" carried the flames hotter and faster. The agency now plans to replicate this failed method of "fire protection" with an estimated 200 new clearcut units deep into the heart of the Cornpatch Roadless Area. These clearcuts target only the largest, most commercially valuable fire-killed trees, while the real fire hazards, the dead "dog-hair" thickets with flashy and ladder ground fuels will be completely ignored.

We need to be aware that the same twisted logic of logging Warner Creek's most valuable wildlife trees to prevent them from reburning will be applied systematically throughout the burned forests of the West. The decimation of native forests through future light it/fight it/log it schemes will continue unless we stop them now in places like Warner Creek, Idaho's Payette National Forest, and the North Cascades Wild Lands.