AT RISK OF LIFE
Mr. Bentley joined in the general laugh that followed Bob’s remark.
“Well, I don’t suppose it could be called exactly comfortable to
have your hands blistered and your hair singed and not know whether
the next minute you’re going to be alive or dead,” he admitted. “But
after all there’s an excitement in fighting a fire and a sense of
victory when you get the better of it that pays for all the work and
pain. It’s a funny thing that when you once get into the work you
don’t want to leave it. Once a forester always a forester seems to
be the rule. I suppose the call of the woods to the forest ranger is
like the call of the sea to the sailor.”
“I guess there’ll always be fires, so that you’ll never get out of a
job,” suggested Frank Brandon.
“Right you are,” replied Mr. Bentley. “Do you know, that with all
the advances that have been made in guarding against fires, more
than three hundred thousand acres of woodland were burned over last
year? Why, that’s equal to a strip ten miles wide reaching from New
York City to Denver. The timber lost in one year would build homes
for a city of four hundred thousand people.”
A gasp of astonishment came from every one of the boys.
“Did you ever!”
“Some loss!”
“What a shame to lose so much valuable timber!”
“Just what I say. Why can’t people be more careful with fire?”
“Those are mighty big figures,” commented Frank Brandon. “What are
the causes of so many fires?”
“There’s a host of causes,” replied Mr. Bentley. “But most fires
could be avoided. In one district last year, nearly forty per cent.
of the fires were caused by smokers. Campers knock the sparks out of
their pipes and throw away half smoked cigarettes. They fall in a
little heap of brushwood that perhaps is as dry as tinder, smoulder
there for a time and a little later break out into flames. The
Government is doing all it can by signs and warnings to curb the
evil, but as long as there are careless and inconsiderate people
there will be forest fires.
“Then too, lightning is responsible for many fires. Often that
brings its own remedy with it, for lightning usually occurs during a
rain storm, and the water that comes down drowns out the fire that
the lightning starts. But it doesn’t always work that way.
“Sometimes it’s a meteor that does the damage. Those big stones are
sometimes white hot when they strike the ground, and if that ground
happens to be in a thick wood, a fire is almost inevitable. Of
course it isn’t often that that happens, but when it does, it has to
be reckoned with, believe me!
“I’ve known of many fires that have been started by these fire
balloons that you see sometimes drifting along the sky especially
around the Fourth of July. It happens sometimes that the inflammable
material in the balloons has not completely burned itself out when
the balloon reaches the ground. If this happens in a dry spot in the
woods, a fire is not only likely, but is a practical certainty.
“You’d think it strange perhaps,” the ranger went on, as he looked
with a smile about the room, “if I told you that sleet and snow are
responsible for many forest fires.”
“Sleet and snow!” exclaimed Bob. “Why, I should think it would be
just the other way around and that they’d help put out fires instead
of causing them.”
“That would be the natural supposition,” conceded Mr. Bentley. “What
I mean is this. Whenever the winter has been very severe and there
have been heavy storms of sleet and snow, the trunk and branches get
loaded with tons and tons of ice. As a fierce gale often accompanies
the storm, the heavily burdened trees are blown down. As the summer
comes on, the dead tree and branches dry out, and all they need is a
spark to set them going. If those dead masses of brushwood had been
standing, living trees, the spark would have had nothing to feed
upon and would have died out harmlessly.”
“Even nature seems in league against you, as well as the
carelessness of men,” remarked Mr. Brandon.
“That’s what,” agreed Mr. Payne Bentley. “And there are times when
one is tempted to grow disheartened. But great as the losses are,
they’re not so heavy as they used to be. We’re gradually getting the
best of the fire fiend, although at times progress seems slow. It’s
only when you compare conditions of to-day with what they were
before the Government woke up that you realize what great strides
have been made in the protection of the forests.
“Of course, the most important thing in limiting the fire loss is
the education of the public. They’ve got to cooperate and help stop
the tremendous waste. When you realize that in the last five years
there have been one hundred and sixty thousand forest fires in the
United States and that at least eighty per cent. of these were
preventable you see who’s responsible. The public is starting more
fires than the small force of forest rangers can put out. Of course
one way would be to forbid the public to camp in or travel through
the national forests during the dry season. But that would be a
hardship when you realize that more than five million people enjoyed
their outings in those forests last year. Yet Canada has had to
forbid it, and the United States may have to come to the same thing
if tourists and campers will persist in leaving the burning embers
of their campfires behind them and throwing from traveling
automobiles lighted cigars into the brushwood.”
“What do you chiefly rely on in your work?” asked Frank Brandon.
“Airplanes and radio,” replied the ranger. “The airplanes are the
eyes of the service and the radio is the tongue. The airplanes scout
around above the forests, always on the watch for the slightest sign
of smoke or flame. The instant they detect it they radio the news to
all the listening stations for miles around. And they’ve grown so
skilful in placing the exact location of a fire that in the squadron
I was with last year thirty-three per cent. of the fires that were
reported were within a quarter of a mile of the exact point stated.
Nineteen per cent. came within half a mile, as was determined later
by actual surveys of the ground. And none of the others were far out
of the way. That’s something of a record, when you think of the
height at which the aviators are flying and the wide extent of space
that they have to cover.”
“I should say it was,” agreed Mr. Brandon, with a nod.
“And think of the promptness with which it was done,” went on Mr.
Bentley. “Within ten seconds after the first trace of fire was
discovered, the news was known for all of a hundred miles around.
“The airplane comes in handy, too, for carrying trained fire
fighters to the scene of the trouble. I remember once carrying a
bunch of rangers in seventy minutes to a burning area. To travel the
same distance by land, journeying by canoe and by portage, would
have taken three days.
“We flew at a height of three thousand feet, and when we got there
we could trace the whole outline of the fire and decided where the
firefighting gangs who came hurrying from every direction could best
be placed.
“I tell you that was some strenuous job! Up in the air your eyes are
burning and smarting from the pungent fumes that come from the trees
below, and it is as much as you can do to see at all.”
“Just what was the plan on which the men did the work when they
started to put out the fire?” asked Herb, with intense interest.
“First,” Mr. Bentley replied, “the gangs attacked the fire at its
most dangerous point, which we pointed out to them. Some trees in
the line of fire they chopped down. Then they cut fire lines through
the leaf litter to mineral soil, threw sand on burning stumps and
used water wherever it was available. They worked by shifts and got
their food when they could.
“During that time, while one plane would be directing the work by
radio messages, another plane would be busy in bringing supplies and
food for the men. The fire lasted nearly a week before it was fully
subdued, and, I can tell you, by that time we were all in!”
“It’s too bad that you have to rely so completely on man power,”
commented Mr. Brandon. “No matter how much grit’s behind it, the
time comes when human muscle has reached its limit and can do no
more. It would seem as though in some way the machinery which does
so much work in the cities could be used for similar purposes in the
forest.”
“It would seem so,” agreed Mr. Bentley. “But the difficulty of
transportation through a wilderness, that often has faint trails
instead of beaten paths and sometimes not even those, is so great
that I doubt whether machinery can ever be utilized on a large
scale.
“We have made a little progress though in that direction. There’s a
clever little pump that is operated by gasoline and weighs only one
hundred and twenty pounds, so that two men can carry it along a
forest trail. Each pump is provided with twelve hundred feet of
hose, which gives it an effective radius of about a quarter of a
mile, and a very small brook will suffice to supply it with water.
It’s a dandy little machine, and I’ve known it to do the work of
from sixty to seventy-five men working with shovels, hose and axes.”
“Some pump!” ejaculated Joe, in admiration.
“Almost as good as an engine,” came from Bob.
“Yes,” agreed Mr. Bentley. “But of course it can be used only when
there happens to be water near at hand. No doubt the time will come
when chemicals will be used instead of water, and then the pumps can
work anywhere. But chemicals are of use chiefly at the start of a
fire, and perhaps wouldn’t be feasible for anything on the scale of
a forest fire.
“So for the present at least, and probably for some time to come,
we’ll have to rely on the men in the Forest Service. I don’t mean
that they have to do their work alone. When the alarm is given
everybody pitches in and works like a beaver. There’s never any lack
of volunteers. All in the vicinity unite to fight the common peril.”
“Gee!” exclaimed Jimmy, his eyes shining, “I wish I had a chance to
fight a forest fire.”
“Same here,” came in a chorus from the other Radio Boys.