The largest fire in the state history is burning in Washington. This year's particularly bad fires had predictable, perhaps preventable, origins.
"More than 900,000 acres have already burned this year in Washington wildfires, more than doubling last year’s total, and the Okanogan complex fire is the largest in state history," reports Evan Bush in a feature article examining the cause of this year's devastating wildfire season.
Bush notes that the state's wildfires were predictable, before they became unprecedented. He goes on to list some of the causes for the size and number of conflagrations, with more details describing each:
- The forests and grasslands are not healthy.
- Government spends too little on wildfire-prevention measures.
- Drought has choke Northwest forests of moisture.
- More people are living in wildland areas.
- Climate change won't help.
That penultimate point is worth noting in planning circles—as settlements continue to spread, so too does risk from wildfires.
FULL STORY: Why we have such large wildfires this summer
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City of Albany
UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies
Mpact (formerly Rail~Volution)
Chaddick Institute at DePaul University
City of Piedmont, CA
Great Falls Development Authority, Inc.
HUDs Office of Policy Development and Research