Fire managers predict busy season in western US

Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Federal fire managers predict relentless drought and low snowpack in northern California will bring a busy wildfire season this summer, a troubling outlook for a region of the West that got scorched last year. The National Interagency Fire Center, headquartered in Boise, released a 2009 Wildland Fire Outlook on Friday also forecasting above normal fire activity in north-central Washington, southern Arizona and southern New Mexico.

In northern California, where nearly 1 million acres burned last year, the report says a dry spring is expected to exacerbate several years of drought and bring on an early wildfire season. The potential for significant fire activity is expected to begin in northern California in May and increase from June through August, the report says.

The fire center defines "significant fire potential" as a wildfire likely to require help from outside the region where the blaze started. "We are very concerned going into a third season of a drought with already dry conditions," said Daniel Berlant, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection….

A 2001 fire in Shoshone National Park, Wyoming