Recent Fires
Several serious forest fires have plagued the monument in the latter part of the 20th century, including in the Cerro Grande Fire of 2000 and the Las Conchas Fire of 2011. The Cerro Grande Fire originated as a controlled burn for fire control but spread out of control owing to high winds, eventually burning over 40,000 acres (16,000 ha) of forest and destroying 250 homes in Los Alamos. Controlled burns were re-conducted in 2006.
The 156,000-acre (63,000 ha) Las Conchas Fire began on June 26, 2011 just west of the park. At the time it was largest wildfire in New Mexico's history and burned over sixty percent of monument land. The fire burned along Frijoles canyon but was stopped before Alcove house and the visitors center. Deforestation of upper canyons and soil vitrification lead to massive flash flood events. The fire and flooding had a devastating impact on area's habitat and cultural resources.
Read more about this topic: Bandelier National Monument
Famous quotes containing the word fires:
“My flowery and green age was passing away, and I feeling a chill in
the fires had been wasting my heart, for I was drawing near the
hillside above the grave.”
—Petrarch (1304–1374)
“The lumberers rarely trouble themselves to put out their fires, such is the dampness of the primitive forest; and this is one cause, no doubt, of the frequent fires in Maine, of which we hear so much on smoky days in Massachusetts.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)