High winds push prescribed burn out of control in Nevada

Martin Griffith

Monday, Oct. 23, 2000 | 10:57 a.m.

RENO, Nev. - Firefighters gained the upper hand Saturday on a 2,000-acre wildfire in the Pine Nut Mountains near Minden that began as a prescribed burn.

Bureau of Land Management fire information officer Mark Struble said higher-than-expected winds caused the burn to jump its perimeter Friday.

Struble said the burn behaved as expected Wednesday and Thursday, but took off Friday after winds of up to 35 to 40 mph raced through the area 16 miles east of Minden.

The Como fire was 40 percent contained Saturday evening, with full containment expected Sunday evening. The blaze was relatively inactive after light snow fell Friday night.

No homes were threatened and no injuries were reported.

"We are fortunate that unlike Los Alamos, there were no structures even remotely close," he said. "If this had been July with winds like that, we would have been very worried.

"If we had known there would be gusts 15 to 20 mph higher than expected, we wouldn't have done the prescribed burn."

A wildfire roared through 47,000 acres and left 405 families homeless in Los Alamos, N.M., after a prescribed burn set by the National Park Service got out of control in May.

Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt lifted a month-long moratorium on controlled fires in June after the blaze. Controlled burning still is the management tool of choice.

"There's usually a fairly narrow window when weather conditions are just right for a prescribed burn," Struble said.

"We'll definitely take an internal look at why this fire spilled over. We try to learn from mishaps at any point on a project like this."

The fire was burning pinyon pine, juniper and sagebrush on undeveloped BLM land. It was deliberately set to improve forage for wildlife.

"The good news is that this area was within a prescribed burn unit anyway," Struble said. "It just burned sooner than we liked."