The Washburn Fire has largely been kept out of the Mariposa Grove of Sequoias at Yosemite National Park/NPS
Though the Washburn Fire continues to burn and grow in size at Yosemite National Park, the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias seems to have avoided the flames thanks to on-the-ground operations to protect the trees.
On Saturday crews were focused on mop-up operations and hazard tree removal work around the grove, and Wawona residents and property owners were told they would be able to return to that area Sunday under special guidelines.
The blaze's footprint measured 4,822 acres across southern Yosemite and parts of the Sierra National Forest on Saturday morning, and containment lines had been built around 37 percent of that footprint.
Most of the park, including Yosemite Valley, was open to visitors.
In the Mariposa Grove, perhaps the most iconic sequoia grove in the world with more than 500 mature sequoias, firefighters used hand tools and created artificial clouds of humidity with sprinkler systems that also wet down the forest floor to protect the sequoias. The crews also used chainsaws to slice up and move downed trees away from standing sequoias, and also raked flammable forest duff away from the giants.
The fire started on Thursday, July 7, of unknown cause, though it's not thought to have been sparked naturally. Feeding the flames were "very heavy accumulations of available dead surface fuels with ample snags, downed timber, and concentrations in an old-growth forest condition," the day's fire briefing noted. "Representative fuels include large timber with an understory of young conifer and shrubs. Very deep duff and accumulation of timber litter (branchwood and needles) dominate the forest floor. Recent large fire scars in the area include woody fuels and recent shrub growth. Live fuels (shrubs/brush) are seasonally moist and are providing limited intensity and spread."
Continued dry and hot weather in the days ahead was expected to lead to active fire behavior, with "episodes of group torching, short crown runs," the briefing document said.
There was no estimated date of full containment.
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Good news!