After Colorado's largest wildfire, salvaging the ecosystem begins

The heavy smoke that hung over Grand Junction for weeks has dissipated. People who had evacuated from their rural homes have returned. But the Pine Gulch fire, now the largest in state history, isn’t over. It’s entering a new phase. On a recent morning, fire official Mark Jamieson stood in a blackened desert, with its singed bushes and trees, not far from Colorado 139. He explained that his crews still have hot spots to worry about, but that’s not all they are working on. “A big part of it is, this rehabilitation of the damage we do when we’re fighting the fire,” he said. “So that’s our mission, really, is to start fixing things, putting them back as good as we can.” Jamieson, an operations section chief for the Southern Area Red Team, stood next to one of those projects: a wide, dusty path cut by a bulldozer to help stop the fire. His crews will do their best to erase that dozer line, smooth out the dirt and scatter the bushes that were pushed aside. The Pine Gulch fire has burned through more than 139,000 acres of rough, isolated country, with rolling hills, high mesas and rugged cliffs. Restoring this area is not just about aesthetics. It will help prevent the erosion and flash flooding that often follow wildfires...MORE