Hazards - Fire

... part of the Canadian province of New Brunswick, and in 1988, fires blackened huge tracts of forest in Alaska, and Wyoming¡¦s famous Yellowstone National Park.

Preventing forest fires Forest fires destroy more than a million hectares of trees every year in the USA alone. It is a cost benefit protecting forests from fires as it only costs a fraction of the potential value. Vulnerable houses can also be victims of forest fires if protection isn¡¦t taken and as the forest is one of the most expensive places for people to live, especially in America, protection is taken. Preventing forest fires would be extremely difficult if lightening started all fires. In fact people who drop lighted cigarettes onto the undergrowth cause nine out of ten forest fires in the USA. Human carelessness is a large factor of forest fires in most countries too. To try to prevent forest fires started by people forest rangers erect notices warning people about the causes and consequences of forest fires. Another way of prevention, to help prevent wild/forest fires is to cut `fire breaks` through the forest. This is a cleared area of land with no trees or undergrowth for the fire to latch on to and feed off, it also acts as an access points through the forest if the fire was to breach the break. Here is an example of fire breaking.

Fighting forest fires Fighting forest fires has special difficulties, one difficulty is to spot the fire before ...