The Washington herald., 1913-03-30

acres Of forest lapds are burned, over.
The public is familiar with tho forest
fires Of recent years. but very few real
ixe their great extent. We have now
about 2,0o0 rangers and guards whose
sole duty 1t is to patrol the trails and
climb the lookout stations throughout the
country. But even this force In made
quate promptly to discover and extin-
guish every fire. Now, II man In =
flying machine can cover an entire forest
In one day, or even reach a point where
he can see, with the aid Of glasses, the
smoke that shows the presence OF q fire,
Il can be seen what q great saving In
time and money would result. Prompt
ness Of discovery Is especially valuable
in the case of any forest fire. but espe-
cially SO where most Of the forest area Ii
covered with chapparal and brush. A
fire will flash in this cover, and unless
sighted and put out almost at once is
sure to spread and in a short time be
beyond control.
frequently finds Ii the precipitous char
acter Of the country. The forest ranger.
without great loss of time, cannot see
fro.I one canyon into another, and some
times fire may smolder for hours be-
fore II Is seen. But in an aeroplane, by
ascending to a considerable height,
man can see for fifty miles In every
direction. and sight the column of smoke
from a fire as soon as II arises.
In the trials last winter two men went
up in a machine and covered distance
Of about twenty miles. They took with
them a small tent and provisions suffi-
cient to last them four or ftve days; also
a pair of large field glasses and a cam
era. In order to give the plan thor
ough try-out. two brush fires were start
ed some distance back in the mountains.
The men were up not more than ten min
utes before they discovered the fires,
and with the aid Of a compass and map
made A very close estimate Of the To-
cality where the fires were burning. They
Immediately descended. As the super
wiser already knew the location of the
brush fires the test was at once pro-
nounced a success. In this way the prac-
tical value of the aeroplane in the i'm
portant work Of fire patrol was demon
strated. And In the very near future
Uncle Sam expects to have several ma
chimes in the vicinity of national forests
to serve as aero guards for the forests
Of the country.
Fred G. Plummer Is one of Uncle
Sans forest fire experts at Washington.
In speaking of the new plan of using
the heliograph and the aeroplane. he
gave many interesting reasons why all
possible means should be adopted to de-
tect fire in the forests before II be-
came dangerous. You know" said he.
''all fires start on the ground. except a
few which start from lightning. II a fire
is going to be controlled, II must be pre-
vented from becoming a crown fire-from
getting into the tops of trees. When il
becomes crown fire II is beyond all hu-
man control. Last year 15 per cent of
the fires We're put out before any mate
rial damage was done. This was largely
due to the prompt discovery and trans
mission of the alarm and the rapidity
with which men got to the fire. An Illus
tration OF the sharp look -out now being
kept over the national forests was the
recent incident of a forest ranger To-
Gated on the top Of a high mountain
who telephoned into town about twen-
" miles away that they had a fire In
that town. The lookout on the noun
tain top twenty miles away discovered
the fire In the town before the towns, :,
people themselves knew anything about
II. SO he promptly telephoned and had
the local fire department on the scene
within a few minutes. In this way he
probably prevented a disastrous fire in
the town itself
THE heliograph will supplement the
telephone. the night lantern. and the
wigwag signalling systems We are now