California will hire nearly 900 new seasonal firefighters to make up for a dwindling number of firefighting inmates as wildfires already have blackened more acreage than last year.
The state has long relied on thousands of incarcerated firefighters as the “infantry” of its forces fighting wildfires. But with an outbreak of the novel coronavirus at a key Northern California training hub, combined with efforts to reduce numbers of prisoners, only 94 of the state’s 192 inmate fire crews are available.
“We are now walking right into the thick of firefighting season,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said at a press briefing today, standing in front of a new Blackhawk helicopter intended to bolster the state’s fire suppression efforts. “Let us be vigilant.”
So far slightly more acreage has burned this year compared with last year. But it’s less than half the average annual acreage burned over the past five years; fires scorched 23,640 California acres through July 5th, compared to an average of 51,215.