Leadership in the Interior Department and National Park Service have publicly been silent on the Grand Canyon National Park fire that destroyed the historic Grand Canyon Lodge, prompting U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman to demand answers from President Donald Trump.
“As you have insisted in many, many other cases, the ultimate responsibility for policy decisions lies with you and your appointees, not with career civil servants,” Huffman wrote in a letter sent Monday to the president. “Yet incredibly, we have not heard anything from you, or from Secretaries (Doug) Burgum and (Brooke) Rollins about this massive fire and the destruction it has wrought [on] one of America’s most iconic national parks.”
The Dragon Bravo fire was sparked by lightning on July 4 and initially was being managed for "resource benefits," Grand Canyon staff said initially. But on July 11th and 12th strong, gusty winds out of the northwest blew the fire out of control, sending it into the iconic lodge and surrounding guest cabins. As of Monday morning the fire was just 8 percent contained and covered nearly 13,000 acres.
“While managed fire practices are a necessary tool in many circumstances... it appears they were clearly the wrong approach in this case given the exceptionally hot, dry, and volatile conditions on the ground," Huffman's letter (attached below) read.
"Understanding that incident management is initiated by federal agency staff at the local and regional level, politically appointed leaders at the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture should have received daily reports from the ignition of the fire on July 4th and should have informed the White House of developments," Huffman, the top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee," also pointed out in the letter.
More than 850 personnel were on the North Rim fire lines. Light rain was in the forecast, but it was expected to be accompanied by gusty winds that could be troublesome, the daily fire briefing said. Some firefighters were working to protect the Kaibab Lodge outside the park from the fire.
Among the questions Huffman asked were whether "senior Interior and Agriculture Department officials or the White House raise any concerns or objections to the proposal to allow the fire to continue burning given the hot and dry conditions on the ground and lack of containment" and "[D]id the Interior or Agriculture Departments make any requests for firefighting resources or personnel that were not granted?"
Along with seeking answers to those questions by August 4, the Democrat also requested "all Incident Action Plans, Fire Management Plans, and any correspondence between regional federal employees involved with management of the Dragon Bravo Fire (including Grand Canyon National Park
and Kaibab National Forest) and leaders at the Departments of the Interior and Agriculture, including Secretaries Burgum and Rollins, and other appointees as well as with National Park Service and U.S. Forest Service headquarters."
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