U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service: Trump Administration Reduces Wildfire Risk by Record 5.4 Million Acres
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Of the more than 1.5 million acres treated by Interior, the Service's Fuels Management Program in FY2020 successfully completed more than 590 individual fuels treatments that directly and positively impacted 356,630 acres of Refuge System-managed lands. Of these hazardous fuels treatments, 84 percent occurred within the wildland-urban interface, better protecting communities and infrastructure from unwanted wildfire. During the Trump Administration (2017-2020), the Service has conducted 2,508 hazardous fuels treatments on more than 783,900 acres of Service lands - helping to conserve, protect and enhance fish, wildlife, plants and their habitat.
With more than 75 million burnable acres where 80 percent of this land has evolved with fire, the Service's fire program is responsible for protecting more land management units than any other federal agency. The Service committed over 251,000 hours of personnel time fighting wildfires and 64,000 hours of personnel time responding to all-hazard incidents in FY2020.
These efforts support
Since the beginning of FY2020, Service lands experienced 339 wildfires that either started on or burned onto Service lands totaling 169,469 acres burned. So far this year, 76 wildfires have interacted with the agency's fuels treatments, successfully slowing the spread of wildfire. Without fuels treatments in these fire-prone areas, wildfires have the potential to impact local communities, sensitive ecosystems and wildlife populations.
After a wildfire, the Service works quickly to stabilize, restore and enhance burned areas and protect waters, roads and communities from erosion and sedimentation. Thus far in 2020, the Service has seeded more than 150 acres to stabilize soil and prevent erosion. Through burned area rehabilitation, a long-term action to repair wildfire-caused damages, Service crews have started strategic restoration on 895 acres.
Partnerships are an important component of the Service's fire-management program. This year, through prescribed fire or mechanical forest fuel reduction, the Service provided mission support to nine
In the early months of 2020,
For more information on the fire management at the Service, visit https://www.fws.gov/fire/.
For more on the
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