U.S. Forest Service

The federal government has issued new guidelines to wildland firefighters for the voluntary use of protective masks. The move comes as knowledge of long-term health risks faced by such workers – including cancer – grows.

The federal government currently spends significantly more on suppressing fires than preventing them.

The Trump administration wants to open up millions of acres of national forest lands to new roads and development, including 3.2 million in Wyoming. Public comment on the proposal is open, but only for about a third of the usual amount of time.

For millennia, Indigenous peoples have intentionally set fires to care for the land. Colonization and fire exclusion largely put an end to those practices, though the tradition endured. Now, California tribes have opened the door to a new era of cultural burning - a potential model for the rest of the West.

An all-female trail crew maintains trails in the wake of federal firings. Is the worst still to come?

But it isn’t easy since she never knows when she could lose her job again. The Supreme Court recently approved the mass firings.

Montana is home to the first agreement of its kind in the nation.

The plan, released last week by Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, would eliminate the Forest Service’s nine regional offices over the next year, including offices in Montana, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah. Retirees from the agency said they were "extremely concerned."

Consolidating wildfire response could professionalize the field and increase efficiencies, according to the expert WPR talked to. But it could also mean fewer of the collaborations that reduce the risk of destructive burns.

For three years now, Sacha Wells, an interpretive ranger for the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests, has made “Ground Squirrel High School” an annual summer exhibit. Last year’s theme was prom. This summer, it’s spirit week.