The federal government has run out of firefighting leadership teams to deploy as wildfires rage across the western United States.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Thursday:
As powerful wildfires rage across the West, including in California, Nevada, Oregon and Idaho, the federal government this week ran out of leadership teams to oversee firefighting efforts.
The 44 incident management teams that travel to big fires, each made up of dozens of experienced employees who develop strategy and coordinate slews of firefighters, are all tied up, taking required time off to rest, or preparing for their next assignment, according to federal officials.
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With nearly 70 large fires burning in the western United States, including Southern California’s Line Fire, Bridge Fire and Airport Fire, the incident management teams have become overstretched and, since Sunday, unavailable for new assignments. It has happened during busy periods before but is uncommon.
State and local authorities will have to rely more heavily on their own firefighting capabilities. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced this week than nearly 6,000 personnel had been mobilized this week to deal with fires.
Some areas facing wildfires are dealing with drought; in others, such as California, two successive rainy winters have provided more fuel than usual for wildfires to burn, especially in the absence of more active forest management.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
