From Snow To Ash

Having worked for the U.S. Forest Service in college and now owning property adjacent to the Glacier Peak Wilderness area in the North Cascades, it's become increasingly clear that climate change has severely increased wildfire incidents while limiting backcountry access over the past decade. Backcountry recreational opportunities have slowed to a trickle during prime time due to longer and more severe wildfire seasons.

This fire season, by far the worst in the past 10 years, wildfire activity started prematurely with the Pomas Fire on Entiat Ridge near Lake Wenatchee, burning more than 3,000 acres in the Glacier Peak Wilderness Area. The lightning-caused fire, first reported in June, immediately closed the Chiwawa River Road for the remainder of the season, blocking access to some of the most spectacular wilderness country in Washington.

By July 4, as campfires were banned throughout Chelan County, backcountry access became severely limited. Then, in September, lightning storms sparked more wildfires of major significance in the Wenatchee Valley, such as the Lower Sugarloaf Fire (above, as seen from Leavenworth), the Labor Mountain Fire and the Wildcat fire, producing unhealthy air quality throuough the rest if the season.

While individual fires used to be the norm 20 years ago, overall trends in wildfire today are consistent with climate change projections and what can be expected in the future. Furthermore, climate change will play a role in the frequency, size and severity of wildfires in the Northwest. Until we started taking climate change seriously, backcountry recreation opportunities will become just a fond memory.