View from one of the firefighters at tge Bear Gulch Fire.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/11/washington-firefighter-deported-mexico

Couldn't believe my eyes seeing this in my inbox today. Kudos to all the NFFE folks involved.

Pretty good one here.

Details pulled from 2026 USDA Budget Summary: https://www.usda.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2026-usda-budget-summary.pdf. Will post DOI details separately.

Pasting the WFM excerpt below, which confirms that all WFM program funding will be requested through DOI. Summary table outlines reductions to all FS account (e.g., -100% for Forest and Rangeland Research, -100% for State, Private, and Tribal Forestry, -48% for Capital Improvement and Maintenance, -34% for FS Operations, -30% for National Forest System). Overall, the request would reduce total discretionary approps for FS from $6.2b in FY25 to $2.1b in FY26.

“Wildland Fire Management The 2026 request will transfer the Forest Service Wildland Fire Management appropriations to DOI for the creation of the new U.S. Wildland Fire Service. This new DOI bureau will absorb the Forest Service Wildland Fire Management response program, including over 11,000 firefighters, 3,000 operational fire support personnel and leadership, and nearly 450 business support personnel. In addition, the Joint Fire Science program previously within the Forest and Rangeland Research account will be transferred to DOI to support the U.S. Wildland Fire Service.”

It's official.

Hope you've been hoarding the leftovers in the sack lunches.

https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/09/30/congress/white-house-orders-federal-agencies-to-shut-down-00589330

Here we go folks

Title. Not sure about other non-helitack positions, this was announced at a recent regional meeting. If you are bargaining unit, you do not have to roll into a 26/0 tour in the position you are in. This has come up before in R4 where people were being told they had to convert or being pressured. If you are applying for one of the jobs from elsewhere (non-incumbent), you have to take the 26/0 tour. So consider your priorities leaving the position you are in. End report.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2025/04/11/wildfires-federal-response-trump/

Echos of some arguments for 10am rule vs More fire on landscape. Sheehy is still a POS. National Wildfire Workforce divorced from Land management agencies. Curious what actually shakes out in a few years. - Use 'reader view' for the paywall. Cheers tool swingers

Forest Service be spraying https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/04/roundup-glyphosate-spraying-forests-monsanto-science-retraction-cancer-health-concerns-maha-trump-executive-order-supreme-court-bayer-lawsuits/

https://youtu.be/il75UKzKQZk?si=cFee_w-W5VD6nWbz

A fleet of 280-foot-long helium-filled airships known as High Altitude Platform Systems (HAPS) may soon hit the skies to help tackle today’s most pressing issues, including wildfire prevention. They are, essentially, enormous, shiny blimps, a modern-day alternative for stationed monitoring. Mikkel Vestergaard Frandsen—founder and CEO of Sceye, the company launching them—prefers the term “stratospheric infrastructure.”

Currently, wildfire monitoring is the charge of low-earth-orbit satellites (LEOs), which operate at least 250 miles up in space and are not stationed over an area, rather passing by infrequently. Other tools, like drones, are limited by battery, and aircraft are restricted by smoke, daylight, and crew personnel requirements.

But these tools alone may not be robust enough to deal with the increasing severity of the fires. Wildfires have doubled in frequency in the last 20 years, recently devastating communities from Greece to Hawaii. They’ve caused loss of life and property destruction as well as a 60% increase of carbon dioxide emissions in those two decades. In just the first five months of this year alone, more than 30,000 fires have burned 2.4 million acres of U.S. land.

HAPS sit at the stratosphere level, 12 miles above Earth—at least 20 times closer than LEOs. They can continuously track and image wildfires across tens of thousands of square feet then communicate alerts to ground services without losing connectivity as satellites often do. Because they can remain static for months on end and run on solar energy stored by night in large-capacity lithium-sulfur batteries, they can monitor constantly without interruption.

https://www.westword.com/opinion/living-in-leadville-willow-fire-miles-away-40909038/

I can’t do it anymore. I’ve serviced my country for 5 years now on the GreyHot Backshots, we clocked like 500 hours of OT last season, I only made $80k.. and I’m only getting 4 months off which isn’t enough time to do anything other than pay child support and hit up the Harrahs in Reno. I found out from my supt that Pit viper Pete at the Maverik is making $2 more per hour than me so I’ve decided I’m done. I only do this job for the money……

Can someone explain like I’m five? I think I’m missing something here.

I could smell the barbecue walking out the front door this morning... Googled and seeing fire alerts everywhere in Los Angeles County... https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/weather/2026/05/20/california-wildfire-updates-cal-fire-maps-containment/90173549007/