Why California Has More Wildfires Than Finland
Our President, distorting the words of the President of Finland about forest management, believes that there are fewer forest fires in a snow-covered country than in California, because they collect leaves in the desert . Amazingly, this is not true.
According to the New York Times, Finnish forests benefit from luck and unwise forest management:
- Finland is cold and snowy, while California is mostly hot and dry. (Summer temperatures in Finland rarely rise above 60 degrees Fahrenheit, and the weather is usually humid around this time of year.)
- Forest roads traverse Finnish forests, reducing the rate of fires and providing easy access for firefighters.
- Aviation clubs are paid to monitor fires in search of fires from the air.
- Finnish forest managers remove some of the dead trees (not leaves) to remove a small percentage of flammable materials.
Perhaps we could learn from Finland’s strategy, but no amount of raking will make California more humid or slow down the Santa Ana winds fanning the flames, or stop wildfires in places like Malibu are not actually created from forests. …