About 10 miles from where hundreds of firefighters were working to contain the 1,300 acre Rock Creek Fire, a much smaller crew was purposefully lighting the dry forest ablaze last week.
The prescribed fire in the Rattlesnake Creek watershed to the west of Nile is an example of growing interest from forest managers — facing skyrocketing wildfire costs — in fighting fire with fire. Last week's burn was planned years before the Rock Creek Fire broke out, but the juxtaposition of both fires on the Naches Ranger District illustrates why prescribed fire is so important, said Jason Emhoff, fuels technician for the district.
"We are trying to get fire-adapted landscapes like this to a point that they can accept fire and not have it be catastrophic," Emhoff said. "For too long, we didn't do this, so Rock Creek happened, Meeks Table happened."