On the road between Marfa and Fort Davis, one can drive miles without seeing a living thing - there is nothing left alive between the deep blue sky and ash-covered dirt - only some charred fence posts along the road remain.
In Fort Davis, the scars of the fire's path make many acts of heroism obvious. At house after house, one can see where the fire came right up to homes, then split before coming together on the other side to continue its wind-fueled death march. What happened is obvious on its face: residents - defying orders to evacuate - stood shoulder-to-shoulder with volunteer firefighters, and they never gave up on beating back the flames to save their homes. Armed with little more than garden hoses, shovels, and courage, most succeeded. --an except from Harold Cook's excellent on-the-ground post on the Texas wildfires from his blog, Letters from Texas.
The Forest Service reported Sunday that the Possum Kingdom fire was 50 percent contained after burning 166 homes and two churches. The 2-week-old Trans-Pecos wildfire in West Texas was about 75 percent contained Sunday after destroying 23 homes and two commercial structures around Fort Davis a week ago, and an East Texas Piney Woods wildfire 90 miles northeast of Houston was 85 percent contained after burning 7,100 acres.
Reuters reports that, overall, 1.8 million acres of Texas land has already burned:
The amount of acreage burned in Texas in 2011 is almost at the record level set in 2006, when nearly 2 million acres were burned by wildfires. So far this year, more than 1.8 million acres have burned."We're only in April, with some of the worst wildfire months still to come," he said. "We will certainly break that record."
Given the fact that Texas will certainly break the record for the most acres of land that has ever burned, in state history, it is obscene that Texas Republicans -- who control every level of state government, as they have for every year since 2003 -- are planning to do this, according to KVUE news here in Austin, TX:
State funding for volunteer fire departments is taking a big hit. It is going from $30 million to $7 million. Those departments are already facing financial strains.
The State Firemen’s and Fire Marshals’ Association of Texas represents 21,000 state firefighters. The Association says more than 80 percent of volunteer firefighters are reporting taking a personal hit in the budget crisis. They have started using their own money to help pay for equipment and supplies.
“We've seen budget cuts, but this is the worst time that we've ever seen,” said Executive Director Chris Barron. “As far as the budget crisis and the fuel cost stuff for example continues to go up and it doesn't help us out any whatsoever, so with the rising fuel and the budget cuts from the state it's taken a great effect. I think the citizens and the public is going to see that.”
Most of the State of Texas is protected by volunteer departments. There are 879 volunteer departments compared to 114 paid departments and 187 departments that are a combination of both paid and volunteer firefighters.
Here is KVUE's video report:
To summarize:
1.8 million acres of Texas land has burned, guaranteeing Texas will have the worst year for wildfires in recorded history
So far this year local fire departments have saved over 10,000 structures from being burned
There are 879 volunteer fire departments in Texas, compared to 114 paid departments and 187 that are a combination of both
Texas Republicans have voted to cut funding for volunteer firefighters by over 75%.
By the way -- Governor Perry's solution for all of this was simple: pray.
