Wind erosion on burned desert soils has caused traffic fatalities. Watersheds that have lost vegetation will be at greater risk for flooding. The scientists are also working on ways to keep an invasive fire feeding weed called cheatgrass from over-running the area. Summer lightning often starts fires in Nevada, but an abundance of cheatgrass has helped fuel more destructive fires than usual, some covering hundreds of thousands of acres. Native shrubs like sagebrush and shadscale grow several feet apart, reducing a fire s ability to spread.
Cheatgrass helps fires spread faster, and the weed returns before most other plants after a fire.
ARS researchers have found that the first time a cheatgrass rangeland burns, the weed can be thwarted if the site is seeded to native perennial shrubs and grasses that year. Public land managers plan to spread five million pounds of seed using specialized equipment designed for use in rocky, semi-desert soils. A team of U.S. nuclear experts will travel to Japan later this month to learn more about the September 30 critical accident at the Tokaimura uranium processing facility. Criticality means a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, as occurs inside an atomic bomb. The team, led by Department of Energy scientists, will exchange information with their Japanese counterparts on the causes of the accident, which released an undetermined amount of radiation and sent three plant workers to the hospital.