We're a bit late in serving up this morsel from the Minnesota House Environmental Policy and Finance Committee, wherein Chairman Denny McNamara, R-Hastings, left off a discussion of trail grooming to bushwhack into the weeds of
. . .This is not rocket science, it's not. But don't react after the fact and you're always going from one fire to another.
Which reminds me: today we have no fires going on even down in Southwestern Minnesota surrounded by black earth, we can't burn a patch of grass because it might torch Northeastern Minnesota. So sometimes we do stuff that makes no sense to some of us.
Watch Chairman Denny McNamara's tirade against fire safety:
The quick-witted tweeps at the Downstream Team provided a bit of context for this outburst:
Wonder if McNamara is aware that there is a red flag warning in western Minnesota right now #mnleg pic.twitter.com/t22srVoURQ
— Downstream Team (@MNDownstream) April 14, 2016
We're not sure how no starting fires in low humidity and gusting winds makes sense to anyone. AgWeek reported in Fire warning issued for west central Minnesota:
Strong winds and dry heat will mean a heightened chance of fire across west central Minnesota for most of the day Thursday.
The National Weather Service has issued a fire weather warning from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. for multiple counties.
Kandiyohi, Stearns, Chippewa, Lac Qui Parle, Pope, Swift and Yellow Medicine counties are included in a “red flag” warning.
“Any fires that develop will likely spread rapidly,” the warning said. “Outdoor burning is not recommended.”
In many areas, wind could gust at speeds up to 35 mph.
Renville and Meeker counties, along with much of central and southern Minnesota, have been issued a “special weather statement” noting “near critical” weather conditions.
“Dry grasses and brush still exist across the region,” the weather service stated. “Any fire could spread quickly.”
Since Bluestem is located within this zone (in west central Minnesota, not Southwestern Minnesota), we and our neighbors took extra with controlled burns in the days before April 14, since the National Weather Service was predicting worsening conditions as the wind rose and the humidity dropped. As we planted vegetables in our garden just over the Renville County line, we saw the pillars of smoke that indicated farmers and property owners were conducting controlled burns while it was still safe.
The concern wasn't for Northeast Minnesota, but for ourselves. It's not just the fear of wild grass fires, but the cost of putting them out in areas distant from the local volunteer fire departments. As a point of reference, here's Four fire departments battled blaze at Easy Bean Farm near Milan, when a cigarette in a ditch was fanned by strong southerly winds in March 2012.
Few industries are as dependent on the weather as agriculture--and few places in these United State are as dependent on good neighborliness as Minnesota's western prairies. Your neighbors, however far away, are the people you turn to during emergencies and celebration, so we do try not to let the sparks fly in the wind to catch their farms on fire.
Fire weather warnings--and a great deal of common sense--help us to not start grass and farmstead fires. Indeed, we can only where in our region McNamara thought people wanted to conduct a controlled burn on such a day in these parts. He's not a stranger to these parts, as he owns nearly 625 of non-ag acres near Graceville in Big Stone County. That's just west of the zone that day.
We only hope he doesn't encourage folks near Graceville to torch his or their grass patchs on a future red flag day. Complaining about weather conditions and public safety last Thursday isn't the greatest example for a committee chair to set.
The Hutchinson Leader reports that Wildfire Prevention Week Continues Through Saturday.
Photo: Fire damage of a greenhouse at Easy Bean Farm in 2012.
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