Roaring Fork Valley fire departments worry about wildfire risk on Hwy 82
Josie Taris/The Aspen Times
Unmowed grass along Colorado Highway 82’s medians and shoulder might appear innocuous, but to local fire departments, the “one-hour fuels” are a serious wildfire risk.
Under the right weather conditions, an one-hour fuel can go from buried under snow to dried out and flammable in an hour — hence the name.
“I’m driving 82 now, and there’s snow on the median. That can quickly change because (the grasses) are very receptive to wind and other changes in weather such as relative humidity,” said Roaring Fork Fire Rescue Authority Deputy Chief Richard Cornelius. “One-hour fuels with one hour of rain become unavailable to burn. One-hour fuels with one hour of dry (weather) become available to burn again.”
Even though much of the valley received multiple inches of snow early this week, he said that those fuels can revert back to a high-wildfire risk just as quickly with another dry spell.
Cured grasses, or piles of grass mixed with dead and living flora, are a strong fuel that can take a spark from a dragging chain or a cigarette butt and whip it into a blaze that moves to a ladder fuel like scrub oak, then up to a vertical fuel like trees.
Without proper management, the grasses can become the first step in a devastating fire.
“If you get a fire in the median and there’s a little bit of wind, that could very easily move it to the ladder fuels — scrub oak, for example,” he said. “Unfortunately, the wildfire threat is becoming year-round, just because we’re susceptible to climate change.”
Roaring Fork Fire Rescue Authority Chief Scott Thompson first alerted Pitkin County of his department’s concern over the state of the grasses in anticipation of an upcoming meeting with the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT). Mowing the grasses along the shoulder and medians of the state highway is CDOT’s responsibility.
At the meeting, which is scheduled for 11 a.m. on Tuesday, April 2, during the Pitkin County Board of Commissioners work session, Pitkin County Public Works Manager Brian Pettet plans to bring up the issue along with local fire leaders.
The meeting is a chance for local entities to converse with CDOT about all parties’ maintenance, funding, and engineering priorities, he explained.
Pitkin County Public Works mows most county road shoulders to manage wildfire risk and improve pedestrian/cyclist safety. He said his department has never mowed Highway 82, to his knowledge, but assists in noxious weed control.
He and Cornelius both said that the lack of mowing on Highway 82 is likely due to CDOT’s struggle to stay fully staffed and the need to manage higher-priority tasks with the staff it does have.
“It’s great that CDOT’s coming around to talk to the board and jurisdictions to gain insight into our priorities. When you have constraints, like staffing that CDOT has, priorities shift. We want to make sure that what we think as local jurisdictions, from a priority standpoint, are what CDOT thinks are priorities,” Pettet said. “Vegetation control on the highways has come up before.”
Spring weather of warm, dry spells sandwiched between snowstorms can make it hard to determine the best time to mow.
Risks on the road
On Tuesday, March 19, Aspen Fire Protection District responded to a vehicle fire off Highway 82 near Aspen Village. The weather had been warm and dry, days before the Sunday/Monday snowfall dump.
Luckily, the incident cleared in about 45 minutes with minimal wildfire risk, according to Aspen Fire Battalion Chief Ken Josselyn.
Spring conditions when vegetation is dry and the weather warms bring wildfire concerns to the forefront, he said.
“We always have grasses and fuels left from the previous season that got caught underneath the snowpack,” he said. “Initial spring wildfire season is a big concern because everything is so dry at that point, before green up. And if we get strange weather patterns and storms, that can really drive winds if we have any kind of ignition.”
Highway 82 does not comprise much of Aspen Fire’s jurisdiction like it does Roaring Fork Fire, but Aspen Fire Chief Rick Balentine said when responding to vehicle fires, the department evaluates vehicle location, wind, moisture/humidity, and more when weighing wildfire risk.
“Any time we have any kind of structure fire or vehicle fire anywhere near and close to the road, we’re always cognizant of that to make sure we’re looking out for wildfire risk,” he said.
But it doesn’t take a full-fledged vehicle fire to risk wildfire. He and Cornelius both stressed that something as small as a discarded cigarette butt or sparks from dragging chains is enough to start a blaze in those cured grasses.
“I can certainly think of some incidents over the last few years that have been either related to somebody driving down the highway dragging a chain,” Cornelius said. “We suspect other times there’s been a cigarette butt that was discarded, but we haven’t been able to definitively prove that. But it’s probable.”
In September 2023, a collision on U.S. Highway 6 between Eagle and Wolcott caused a vehicle fire that spread to a 27-acre wildfire — median grasses played a role in its growth. The blaze shut down the highway and Interstate 70 for hours.
In a perfect world, the shoulders and medians would be mowed regularly and kept very short, Cornelius said. But in the economic reality of short-staffed departments, cutting the median grass would suffice.
To help manage risk, the firefighters recommended keeping lawn vegetation as short as possible and hardening homes against wildfire. Any type of mitigation helps.
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