Listen to HCN reporters discuss this long-standing institutional problem.
Wildfire
Posted inArticles
Climate change looms large over Obama’s Yosemite visit
As the park prepped for President Obama’s visit, experts hope to highlight a park in flux.
Posted inJune 13, 2016: Water to Dust
El Niño adds fuel to Southwestern fires
In California, Arizona and New Mexico, an underperforming weather pattern increased wildfire risk.
Posted inArticles
Wildfire archaeology exposes treasures of the dead
Wyoming fires revealed long hidden historical artifacts.
Posted inMay 30, 2016: Trial by Fire
Trial by fire
Women in the male-dominated world of wildland firefighting still face harassment, abuse and sexism.
Posted inArticles
Can cutting down trees protect New Mexico’s water?
A new collaboration seeks to ease wildfire’s impacts by thinning overgrown forests.
Posted inArticles
Southwest primed for a nasty fire season
In much of California, Arizona and New Mexico El Niño and La Niña have combined to create dry fuels, ready to burn.
Posted inMay 2, 2016: The Gold King Reckoning
The life of a fire lookout is one of the senses
A former lookout finds the woman who used to guard her tower.
Posted inArticles
How an East Coast think tank is fueling the land transfer movement
ALEC is becoming increasingly involved in the public lands debate by providing model bills for Western states.
Posted inArticles
How smokejumpers prepare for wildfire season
Photos of the rigorous training this special type of firefighter endures.
Posted inArticles
2015 wildfires burned a record-breaking 10.1 million acres
Fires in Alaska help to smash 2006 record.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
Latest: Arizona forest restoration project falls short
The Four Forest Restoration Initiative was supposed to be the largest such project ever attempted.
Posted inArticles
Is the West prepared for climate change?
A new report shows most states are vulnerable to future increases in extreme heat, drought, and flooding.
Posted inArticles
Five new studies that change our understanding of permafrost
Why they matter, even if you don’t live in the Arctic.
Posted inDecember 7, 2015: Good Neighbors
Chronicling seven decades of parachuting into wildfires
A review of Jason A. Ramos and Julian Smith’s “Smokejumper: A Memoir by One of America’s Most Select Airborne Firefighters“
Posted inDecember 7, 2015: Good Neighbors
Gun-toting toddlers in the desert and drunk Brits in the Grand Canyon
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inDecember 7, 2015: Good Neighbors
The last stand of the West’s fire lookouts
Fire detection is becoming more technologically advanced, as the old-fashioned watchtower goes extinct.
Posted inNovember 9, 2015: The Campaign Against Coal
Coalbed methane explainer and post-fire logging.
Hcn.org news in brief.
Posted inArticles
Washington’s long summer of fire and smoke
On Spokane’s west side, the Houston Fire was growing fast. If a wind were to come up and whip flames across a field of weeds, the gate that keeps the world at bay at the entrance to Erika and Andrea Zaman’s lane would do no good. Just in time, Andrea blasted back from the airport, […]
Posted inArticles
Congress tries to speed up contentious post-fire logging
New legislation comes despite science showing timber salvage harms essential wildlife habitat