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Franz Says Washington Already In Record Territory With Wildfires

Courtesy of Northwest Interagency Coordinating Center

Washington Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz toured two of eastern Washington’s major wildfire sites today [Wednesday], where thousands of acres on Indian reservations have burned. They are two of more than a thousand fires reported this season in Washington, already an all-time record, she says.Franz went to Wellpinit to learn about the Sherwood fire, which has burned about 1,100 acres on the Spokane Indian reservation. Then she drove to Inchelium to hear about the progress of a fire burning on the Colville Indian reservation.
 
“We’re not even through the end of July. What we’re seeing on the landscape, the fires that I’ve been visiting, we don’t usually see until late August, typically the peak of our fire season," she said.
 
Those two areas also have some of the worst air quality in the state.

Franz says about 240,000 acres have burned in Washington this season, more than double the acreage burned during the entire 2019 fire season.

"Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to see a break in this for several more months," she said.

Franz says the state anticipated a busy season and made arrangements to have more planes and helicopters available to drop water and retardants than in past years. She says that has paid off because Washington is in a fierce competition with other states for other fire suppression resources. She says the state has worked well with local jurisdictions to pounce on small fires to keep them from growing into mega fires, but she says the pace that firefighters are keeping is taking its toll, with 16-hour days and a season with no end in sight.