Fire Management Planning

Large white, thick plumes of smoke rise above green spruce trees amidst a blue sky.

Denali’s General Management Plan states that “the fire management program goal is to protect human life, property and significant resources while allowing fire to fulfill its role in the ecosystem” (DENA N-520.001). In one sentence, it requests that fire managers stop fire and also allow fire. Fire management planning is the process in which fire managers, guided by national and agency policy, coordinate with park managers and community partners to outline procedures for fire management actions.

Throughout the national parks system, fire management actions are guided by fire management plans. A fire management plan is a document that authorizes work. It allows fire managers to implement fuels reduction treatments, conduct wildland fire and fuels treatment monitoring, and outlines wildland fire response. It ensures that environmental and cultural compliance is followed in consideration of all fire management actions and is reviewed annually by park managers.

The scope of what a plan contains is directed by agency policy with input from interagency wildland fire partners. Local fire management planning is intended to align local fire management actions with the goals of the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy, updated in 2023:

Resilient Landscapes – Landscapes, regardless of jurisdictional boundaries are resilient to fire, insect, disease, invasive species and climate change disturbances, in accordance with management objectives.

Fire Adapted Communities – Human populations and infrastructure are as prepared as possible to receive, respond to, and recover from wildland fire.

Safe, Effective, Risk-based Wildfire Response – All jurisdictions participate in making and implementing safe, effective, efficient risk-based wildfire management decisions.

Fuel Management Planning

One of the main components of the Park’s FMP is the fuels management program, the primary goal of which is to reduce unnatural fuel buildup in areas that are at high risk for a future wildfire. Fuel reduction is the removal of excess plant matter (branches, shrubbery, dead and down material) via mechanized or manually operated tools. It is also done in preparation of prescribed fire treatments. Many fuels projects are designed to consider adaptive management practices ranging in scale from site-specific to landscape-level and achieve resource benefits and protection benefits simultaneously.

Though fire has a role in Alaskan ecosystems, climate change is a causing fire to become even more prominent and widespread. Denali's resilient landscapes are shaped by natural processes. As climate induced changes in fire regimes may erode the resiliency of plant communities and other features sensitive to wildfire events, we may refine our approach to achieving desired conditions through adaptive management. By using the best available science and technology and adhering to adaptive management principles, the Park can make more informed decisions about how, when, and where wildfire may be restored and reintroduced to the landscape for maximum resource benefit.

A group of women stand in a semi-circle facing a woman who is sitting in knee-high grass holding an object. Two of the women are holding clipboards

Toward Fire Adapted Communities

A Fire Adapted Community  is a “human community consisting of informed and prepared citizens collaboratively planning and taking action to safely coexist with wildland fire.” Residents of a fire adapted community are knowledgeable and engaged with mitigating wildland fire risk. Their care and management of local infrastructure, buildings, landscaping, and the surrounding ecosystem lessen the need for extensive protection actions in the event of a wildfire. A fire adapted community is able to safely accept fire as part of the surrounding landscape, and thus allow fire to play its natural role in the ecosystem.

Denali National Park has collaborated with the Denali Borough on their efforts to create Community Wildfire Protection Plans, an important piece of transitioning toward a fire adapted community. These plans are developed by local communities with assistance from state and federal agencies to outline activities and treatments that will protect infrastructure and assess community preparedness. Activities in the Denali Borough have included community workshops and education, fuels reduction projects, and risk assessments and mitigation plans.

A successful fire adapted community approach has the potential to save lives, homes and communities, and millions of dollars in suppression costs annually, while allowing beneficial ecological processes of fire to take place.