Project Fire Season... and a workout.
If you're on the Little Yamsay Fire, you got it pretty good.
This is the time of the season when two things happen… Either you are about to come on for the year, and the anticipation is building, or you’re on the boards thinking about when you‘ll get the first call. If you don’t go right out the door, there can be some lag time between project work and being dispatched.
Once in a while, you get a project fire. I use this as a fairly loose definition, and they can have varying appearances.
There was the large-scale prescribed fire on the Stanislaus last year that I would have called a project fire. It was a prescribed fire that took on fire-like attributes, such as overtime, caterers, and an Incident Command Team. A project fire can also be a fire that’s been turned into a prescribed burn, like the Little Yamsay Fire.
Contrary to popular belief, Lil’ Yamsay isn’t a rapper from Atlanta.
It’s a small little lightning fire nestled in the Chiloquin Ranger District of the Fremont-Winema National Forest. The fire was found days after the storm rolled through as the ignition from Zuez’s electrified hammer toss smoldered in the duff of the tall timbered forest.
These are the early-season fires you wanna get on. Why? Because this wildfire is in the Klamath Basin Priority Landscape, an area known for building boxes and putting fire on the ground. Also known as meeting forest health objectives. The Fremont-Winema National Forest did this successfully last year with the Dillon Creek Fire. That fire started last year on May 20th and the forest turned it into a beautiful managed fire.
So when a Forest wants to meet forest health objectives, what do they do?
You call in a bunch of Hotshot Crews and equipment, dial up a Team, and start making boxes consisting of thousands of acres that would benefit from fire pushing across the landscape. It’s the perfect project fire to get everyone ready for a busy season. It’s a great gig for everyone involved to settle in and build cohesion not only amongst the crews but with aircraft, dispatch, and Teams.
I’m excited to see the results of this operation.
But if you are still sitting and waiting for your turn to get the call, it's the perfect time to get in a workout. The calls will come soon enough, so until then, let’s get after it and have a positive week.
Find yourself a good soundtrack or podcast, and let’s get it done.
Get loose and dynamic stretch until warmed up.
Round 1: Once
Pull up pyramid to 8 and back down. If you need to, use a band or do jumping pull-ups.
1 min weighted wall sit
25 push-ups
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Hotshot Wake Up to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.