Well the title is the question.
With ‘split’ I mean create some space between blocks where fire has nothing to travel to the next block to spread.
I imagine that actions like dropping water with helicopters would also be unnecessary since we could ‘give up’ a burning block and then the fire would be over.
Or am I too naive about it?
In: Earth Science
Other comments are covering how fire spreads, so I’ll add this.
Forests have specific and nuanced wildlife ecosystems. The species that thrive in a forest, need the forest to exist as it has.
For example, you may remember one of the first and most important legal challenges against logging of old-growth forests: *Northern Spotted Owl v. Hoden* (later *Northern Spotted Owl v. Lujan*).
Not to get into all of it, but, one thing that came about. Lumber argued that to protect the owl, they would only ‘clear-cut’ specific squares and as such the forest would look like a checkerboard. Wide swaths of empty nothing next to wide swaths of forests. But that didn’t work. The owls and other birds of prey need cover. They can’t hunt in open fields. Meanwhile the animals (who are prey) that live in cover are exposed in open fields. There are few species that live in old growth forests that can exist in a checkerboard of open fields. That’s just not how it works.
Point being, there are many factors at work here that have an influence on forest management. It’s not just preventing forest fires – which, I’ll add, is a natural part of forest health – but of course NOT fires due to habitat loss/climate change/assholes burning forests because they launched fireworks during a ‘gender-reveal’ party.
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