The National Weather Service issued multiple red flag warnings for communities throughout the state, while communities in Los Angeles’ northwest, including Santa Clarita, Thousand Oaks and Simi Valley, were put under “critical” fire danger. The warnings were issued from Thursday into Saturday due to the strong Santa Ana winds, which are dry winds funneled through canyons and mountains that can reach up to 100 mph and lower relative humidity throughout the Los Angeles region.

The warnings have triggered electric utility providers Southern California Edison and PG&E to warn hundreds of thousands of their customers about the potential for power shutoffs due to the elevated fire danger. On Wednesday evening, Southern California Edison said shutoffs were being considered for over 258,000 customers, while 28 counties were either under required shutoff warnings or watches with PG&E.

“Combined with warm and dry conditions, elevated fire weather conditions will be present across much of the territory later this week and may necessitate (Public Safety Power Shutoff) PSPS in the windiest locations,” PG&E officials said in a Wednesday update. “The fuel moisture content in brush is approaching annual minimum values, if not already there, with most species at critically flammable levels.”

California Office of Emergency Services announced on Wednesday it would be moving firefighters and equipment into Southern California before the dangerous Santa Ana winds arrive. The office also urged residents to prepare for dangerous fire weather and the possible utility power shutoffs.

“Review evacuation routes, develop a wildfire action plan, and pack a go-bag with essential supplies,” the office said in a recent statement. “Sign up for local emergency alerts and follow instructions from local emergency management and public safety officials.”

The 12-day Australia Women-in-Fire Prescribed Training Exchange (AUS WTREX) in May 2025 was evaluated by researchers from Monash University in Melbourne and included interviews with participants.

This article is first published in Wildfire Magazine – read the full edition.

The evaluation report, First Nations women, cultural fire knowledge, wellbeing and memory, includes comments from some of the 30 First Nations women who participated in the program. Participants are identified in the report by number rather than by name.

“You’re around other women and they always push you and they show you new things that you didn’t know, and they didn’t degrade you if you didn’t know, or if you didn’t know an answer you could ask that question,” said Participant 8.

Participant 16 agreed that the majority-women program created a comfortable environment.

“I just felt it was just amazing being in there because usually here at work, our ops are mainly males . . . and I get a bit nervous to ask, can I help out or try to do this stuff? I feel like I’m going to get criticised or judged or if I do something wrong, I’m going to get into big trouble.”

AUS WTREX participants gathered in North Queensland and burned in both the savannah and rainforest landscapes; they shared their knowledge, built their skills, talked about their challenges, and supported each other as fire practitioners.

The WTREX program, from its beginnings in North America, has resulted in the growth of an international network of women in fire management.

Why Australia?

Following the destructive bushfires of 2019-2020 across eastern and southern Australia, the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements highlighted the potential of cultural burning to reduce fuel load and risk and to offer cultural and ecological benefits.

The Australian WTREX event, hosted by the Queensland Fire Department and Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service, provided an opportunity for researchers to document and evaluate how such initiatives brought a cultural benefit to First Nations women working or volunteering in Caring for Country, and fire- and land-management roles. Caring for Country is an Australian Indigenous worldview – the understanding that if you look after Country, Country will look after you. (Country is a term often used by Indigenous peoples of Australia to encompass lands, waters, seas and skies, and the relationships held within Country; this means that if Country is sick or unwell, the people connected to Country are also sick or unwell.) The WTREX evaluation report highlights the profoundly positive impacts of a culturally responsive professional development program on First Nations women.

The report was compiled by Monash University’s National Indigenous Disaster Resilience (NIDR) project and funded by Natural Hazards Research Australia.

The research team was led by associate professor Bhiamie Williamson, a Euahlayi man and academic in Indigenous disaster resilience, and included Nell Reidy, Zoe Schultz and Jess Walters. Canadian researcher Amy Cardinal Christianson advised the team; Christianson is Métis from northern Alberta and an IAWF board member.

Prescribed Fire Training Exchanges (TREX) were developed by the North American-based organization Fire Networks for intensive, hands-on training. In 2015, some female fire managers who participated in a TREX event in North Carolina adapted the program for women, and there have since been WTREX events in the United States, Canada, Portugal and South Africa.

In 2022, the first Indigenous women’s WTREX was hosted by the Karuk Tribe in the Klamath Mountains of northern California – the first time in more than 200 years that the Karuk people had been able to conduct cultural burning on their ancestral lands.

Four Indigenous Australian women from Queensland – Chloe Swiney, Kylee Clubb, Evelyn Ivey and Alex Lacey – were supported by their workplaces to participate in the Karuk WTREX; it was their first experience in such a program, and it inspired them to bring WTREX to Australia.

Lacey, a Ewamian woman and Undara Volcanic National Park ranger, is a co-author of the report along with Swiney and Lacey, and the Monash team. In the report, Lacey describes the event as life changing.

“To have worked with my sisters in fire to bring AUS WTREX to life, and then to see the powerful effect the program has had on other Indigenous women and firefighters from across the world, fills me with pride that we contributed to this growing international network of empowered Indigenous women in fire.”

Twelve days with fire on country

In Queensland, the women enhanced their fire practitioner skills and shared cultural and western burning knowledge. The participants, who ranged in age from 19 to 60-plus, came from a range of professions and workplaces, including fire and land management roles within government agencies and Traditional Owner corporations. (Traditional Owner corporations are legal entities representing Indigenous Peoples who hold traditional rights and responsibilities to a specific area of land and waters (Country).)

Participants learned about incendiary burning, native plant species, the history of savannah and rainforest burning from Traditional Owners, took up roles in the incident command system, and practised traditonal Indigenous weaving with a range of materials.

Researchers used interviews, participant journals, and participant observation to evaluate the program, specifically looking at how First Nations women-led spaces and cultural knowledge exchanges impact wellbeing and memory.

According to the researchers’ report, there was a shared passion among the women toward culture and fire, with some participants describing cultural burning as cleansing. Deeper messages also emerged related to experiences of sexism, fear-based relationships with fire, and the impacts of colonisation and government laws, policies and practices on individual and family wellbeing.

The AUS WTREX participants spoke to researchers about the program as a safe and supportive space alongside other women in fire; this sentiment was particularly significant for those who said they were often the only woman, or the only Indigenous person, in their workplaces.

“The whole [AUS WTREX] program was really a big discussion of what challenges as women we face,” said Participant 3.

“ . . . women in the fire service [are few], but Indigenous women, even [fewer],” said Participant 5.

The research report indicates that participants became more confident through the act of teaching others.

“When I was there, I think it made me realise I actually know a lot of the stuff, especially the fire stuff,” said Participant 16.

“It built me with a lot of confidence in wanting to go and be more than just an operational ranger, which I’ve been for most of my working career, and wanting to go into those even more male-dominated spaces,” said Participant 1.

Participants exchanged knowledge about different burning techniques, learning from women who practice cultural and western-style burning across varied landscapes throughout Australia and overseas. Some participants said they were in awe of other Indigenous women who conduct aerial burns from helicopters.

“So, they were incendiary burners and they’re young women, young Aboriginal women that are doing this. And it’s like, wow, look that they’re out there in the choppers doing incendiary burnings,” said Participant 4.

A safe, supportive program

The evaluation found that the AUS WTREX program was highly valuable, providing a safe and supportive space for First Nations women to build confidence, step into leadership roles, and exchange critical fire skills.

Swiney, the manager of bushfire mitigation for the Rural Fire Service Queensland and one of the event organisers, said the program went far beyond traditional training.

“By bridging the gap between western hazard reduction and cultural burning, the program allowed women to protect cultural heritage while fostering deep personal healing and lifelong professional networks rooted in shared lived experiences,” Swiney said.

“For many, it was their first opportunity to participate in a cultural burn or use their skills to protect cultural heritage.

“The impact went beyond networking and skills development. These women found companionship within a workforce that can be challenging and isolating for First Nations women. They returned to their communities changed and empowered, though the real challenge now is ensuring their workplaces actually recognise and value their expertise when they return.”

The researchers said they hope their report provides a practical framework for the wider emergency management sector; they believe the evaluation demonstrates that investing in targeted, culturally supportive programs directly strengthens workforce capability and wellbeing.

The report concludes that as Australia faces increasingly complex climate challenges, learning from this model offers government agencies a clear pathway to building a more inclusive and resilient frontline workforce.

Schultz, the lead author of the evaluation report and a research fellow with the National Indigenous Disaster Resilience program, said that while gender equity has improved in fire and land management, targeted professional development and support for First Nations women remains scarce.

“While some programs recruit young women into the fire sector, specific professional support for First Nations women already on the frontline is virtually non-existent,” Schultz said. “As Australia faces more frequent and severe fires and floods, we cannot afford to ignore such a highly capable and valuable part of this workforce.

“First Nations women are driving incredible initiatives to protect community and Country, but they are often doing it without adequate support. This research proves that investing in culturally supportive, women-led programs isn’t just a win for gender equity – it directly strengthens our national workforce on the frontline against climate disasters.”

Swiney – speaking in the report as a representative of supportive partner organisation Rural Fires Service Queensland – said she hopes the program has a strong future in Australia.

“AUS WTREX created a space for connection, learning, and knowledge sharing, grounded in respect for culture and Country. I hope this research helps inform and inspire First Nations women in fire, recognising this is just the beginning of something much bigger.’’

David Bruce is the program manager for the International Association of Wildland Fire, based in Melbourne, Australia, and is editor of Wildfire Today.

The research, published on September 28 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that the urine of 1,400 adults from Maui tested 6-18 months after the fires had toxic metal levels far above normal levels, including antimony at nearly 40 times, manganese at 3.8 times, barium at 2.3 times, and arsenic at 2.2 times reference levels. High metal exposure is associated with poor lung health, with the metals that the researchers found contributing strongly to negative health impacts.

While the study lacked pre-fire data of the participants and cannot determine how much of the contamination came directly from the wildfire, researchers emphasized the toxic metals came from a variety of exposures, which the wildfire likely exacerbated.

“The biggest message is that exposure may not end when the smoke clears,” said the University of Hawaiʻi’s Maui Wildfire Exposure Study co-director Ruben Juarez. “What we are likely seeing is a complex combination of exposures – some that may have been present for years and others that may have been generated or remobilized by the wildfire. When a disaster burns through a community, it can fundamentally change how contaminants move through the environment. The next scientific challenge is to disentangle those sources and understand which exposures persist, where they come from and what they mean for long-term health.”

High-metal concentrations were not just found in Lahaina residents. Researchers said residents closest to the fire showed a distinct metal profile, specifically elevated concentrations of arsenic and cadmium. While residents from Wailuku/Kahului and Kula/Kihei showed different metal profiles as well, which researchers say shows there was no single uniform exposure pattern across the island.

“As destructive fires increasingly reach developed communities, researchers say disaster-response systems may need to look beyond short-term measurements of smoke and particulate matter,” the university said in a press release about the research. “Future responses could include longer-term environmental monitoring, human biomonitoring, respiratory surveillance and targeted assessment of soil, ash and settled dust, particularly in places with histories of agricultural or industrial contamination.”

Click here to read the full research.

As the researchers explain, year after year, pollen, charcoal and soil drifted to the lake bottom and settle, stacking up a record of everything that grew and burned around it. A sediment core, a column of mud drilled from the lakebed, lets us read those layers back one year at a time.

“Charcoal tells us what burned. Infrared analysis of the charcoal tells us how hot it burned, magnetic minerals track the soil washing off the land, and radiocarbon dating anchors the whole story in time,” said researchers Professor Michael-Shawn Fletcher, Anthony Romano and Harriet Magee, from the University of Melbourne.

It is worth reading the full research paper in Nature for the full story (subscription required), but the short version is that forest expansion and thickening after British colonisation created landscapes more prone to burning, amplifying the influence of climate change and propelling Australia’s current bushfire dangers.

Before the British settlement on Australia’s shores began in 1788, fire use by the Indigenous Gunaikurnai people of that region maintained stable, open woodlands through frequent, fine-grained, low-temperature cultural burning. Colonial disruption drove cascading changes: increased fire temperature, a fourfold rise in eucalypt cover, a shift from open woodland to forest and increased soil erosion.

Importantly, they conclude, these transformations preceded anthropogenic warming, showing that the vulnerability of these forests to wildfire is shaped by the legacies of colonial land-use.

The researchers call for better integration of Indigenous knowledge into fire management. “Managing fire in southeastern Australia must reach beyond hazard-reduction burns and climate adaptation to restore Indigenous land practice, with Traditional Owners resourced and supported to lead. We are now taking this research to other sites across Australia, to test how widespread the pattern is.

“But Purghagoolah [the lake in the study] already tells us something hopeful. For at least eight centuries, through seasons of severe fire weather, fire came largely on people’s terms. Country needs care. When people care for Country, even dangerous seasons need not bring disaster.”

David Bowman, Professor of Pyrogeography at The University of Tasmania – and not part of this study – said this new research tackled a difficult problem given the sparse data and the complexities of climate-fire-people influences.

“The study has important implications for forest and fire management, supporting calls for thinning of overgrown forests, and restoration of Indigenous patch burning techniques…This task demands substantial and ongoing investment from governments to support Aboriginal fire manager groups to lead fire regime restoration interventions, working alongside scientists and government land managers”

More from what the research team say about this study in this Scimex briefing and in The Conversation.

Related coverage: Fewer destructive fires in Kimberley landscape due to Indigenous-led burning: study

Firefighter with Fire Rescue Victoria and High Threat Response Educator Sam Miletta was the most recent expert to share that warning at the Australasian Fire Authorities Council Conference in September in Melbourne. There, Miletta gave a presentation on how fire is increasingly being used as a weapon in numerous regions across the globe.

His most recent publication, Fire as a Weapon – the European Experience, was published in the counter-terrorism medical journal ASPIS Medical in July 2025. It begins with profiling arsonist Wess Roley, who started the Nettleton Gulch Fire in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, before shooting and killing two responding firefighters and then taking his own life. Miletta’s paper uses Roley as an example of how fire in general can be used as a weapon, both by terrorists and other violent actors.

Despite the wildfire intro, however, Miletta goes on to describe how wildfires and bushfires are the most difficult for a terrorist group to claim credit for, unlike other forms of pyroterrorism like ambushes, hostage situations, and during times of civil unrest. State-sponsored sabotage events using fire as a weapon have seen recent increases in Europe, but known wildfire-specific incidents have remained few and far between.

“Traditionally, in the post 9/11 world, with the heavy focus on the Islamic Extremist/jihadi threat, where their intent was often to spark fear and cause harm, it was difficult to make a claim to wildfires in locations where Governments/authorities in those countries are able to downplay them due to the constant occurrence of accidental and general arson wildfires annually,” Miletta told Wildfire Today. “I think that is why we saw a heavier focus on low-cost confronting attacks such as vehicle ramming, bombings/edged weapon and firearm attacks.”

Miletta said wildfire remains a potential tool for both right-wing groups targeting infrastructure like 5G towers and left-wing environmental groups. The remaining likelihood of a threat is why local, state and federal agencies should prepare for a potential terror-driven wildfire/bushfire event, including:

• Being able to withdraw and rapidly share situational awareness with other units/agencies if the wildfire is being used as an ambush tactic to draw crews in, such as the Idaho event.
• Resource planning/deployment/reserve in settings where resources are intentionally overwhelmed due to multiple wildfires ignited within close geographical areas/jurisdictions.
• Improved intelligence sharing between national security/law enforcement agencies and fire services. This is done in other national security settings, but Miletta suggests it be more common in larger urban locations rather than rural areas susceptible to wildfire.

See also The ABCs of Fire as a Weapon and Australia’s Experience in Salus Journal, March 2023.

In a paper just published in the International Journal of Wildland Fire, the authors argue that although the region has historically linked with a high number of large and intense fires – typically in the late Dry Season – the shift to more strategic burns early in that season have limited both the number and size of extreme fires that would have otherwise been impossible to control and damaging to the landscape.

The Kimberley is a fire-prone savanna region, with much of the biodiversity dependent upon regular fire, but not high intensity destructive fires. The area is sparsely populated with around 700 residents across the 102,000 km2 study area. Fire was used for tens of thousands of years by the Indigenous inhabitants until contemporary times – but in the last decade there has been a resurgence in proactive fire management, primarily, but not exclusively by Indigenous groups, with the Department of Fire and Emergency Services (Western Australia), Western Australia Parks and other landowners.

The study was a group effort of researchers and practitioners from the Balanggarra Aboriginal Corporation, the Dambimangari Aboriginal Corporation, the Wilinggin Aboriginal Corporation, the Wunambal Gaambera Aboriginal Corporation and Charles Darwin University (CDU).

Lead researcher Rohan Fisher, from CDU, said the study suggests that since 2015, hands-on people-driven landscape management has been a more significant driver of fire regime change than climate.

“On-ground, Indigenous-led fire management appears to have played a significant role in reducing the number of the largest and most severe wildfire events. Indigenous leadership on fire management works. Climate change impacts on fire regimes can be managed, with lots of hard work.”

Fisher says the study shows that bushfire mitigation goals have largely been achieved, with a decrease in large fire events’ contribution to total area burned across the North Kimberley over the study period, particularly after 2016.

The analysis showed:

• A dramatic reduction in the number of large fires across the North Kimberley over the last 10 years.
• A small number of large fires (1%) were responsible for a large proportion of the total area burned (55%), while 96% of fire events accounted for only 25% of the area burned.
• Large, severe fires mostly began in areas remote from roads or ground access. These remote ignitions accounted for a substantial proportion of the total area burned late in the year and are most likely to have been lightning-ignited. Arson does not appear to be a primary factor in large fire ignition in the Kimberley. So, any assumption that removing people from the area would remove the risk of fire is not true, with lightning playing the biggest role in fire starts.

Read the full article in the International Journal of Wildland Fire, a publication of the International Association of Wildland Fire and CSIRO Publishing.

The decision to adopt, or to not adopt, any particular innovation is a difficult one that straddles the competing priorities of budget limitations, risk appetite and technological wisdom. How do you know if this is any good? How can we decide if it is worth paying for? Who else is using it?

Firetech Labs has taken up these challenges of innovation adoption with a platform that allows organisations to share insights and track who else is looking at what.

Firetech Labs started in 2025 as a successor to Firetech Connect, a startup hub out of Noosa Council, north of Brisbane, Queensland in Australia. Initially focused on Australia, it now works internationally.

In Canada, Firetech Labs worked with FP Innovations on the recently released Innovation Adoption Framework for the Wildfire Resilience Consortium of Canada. This free and public framework to access technology was a pre-cursor for the development of Firetech Labs online platform – Heyden – that allows agencies share their results.

Heyden coordinates innovation efforts across agencies and groups of agencies that agree to share their data. It shows what technology others are evaluating, piloting and using operationally.

Firetech has just returned from presenting to the World Fire Congress in the United Kingdom, after presenting at the AFAC2026 Intershutz conference in Australia. CEO Connor Wilson noted that despite the interest in innovation, most fire chiefs the world over had a low appetite for risk.

“A standout question at WFC from a European Fire Chief was how do we prove value for money in adopting these tools? Agencies are challenged in that they have tight budgets of public monies and therefore have a very low appetite for procurement risk. They have limited baseline data to measure the current performance of a system which means quantifying improvements is difficult. 

Innovation is listed as an organisational priority in most fire agencies, federal governments and other wildland fire, including AFAC and the World Fire Congress, but the problem is how to practically access it all and find the right fit.

 “Increasing fire severity globally has caused the sector to boom with an influx of government and private investment, with startups and large companies, like Anduril and Airbus, announcing new fire tech innovations.

“The challenge is that these innovations are getting stuck at the door of the agencies. The agencies are tackling the same challenges and require a collaboration platform to share corporate knowledge and lessons learned on the evaluation and adoption of these technologies.

Wilson says that Firetech Labs’ Heyden allows agencies to manage their internal innovation process and also conduct market research on technologies being tested, trialed and adopted across a family of fire agencies, reducing duplication of effort, improving the efficiency of technology adoption. Users can create a free account to view the listings and upgrade to a paid account to access all the features.

Science, policy and practice surrounding how human communities navigate wildfire adaptation continue to evolve across changing social, political, economic and ecological contexts. The latest era of community wildfire adaptation progress elevates shared responsibility for risk reduction, collective action through coordinated mitigation efforts, frequent and transparent interactions between entities, and strategic allocation of resources to support larger, more concerted behavioral and environmental modifications in at-risk places (Charnley et al. 2020; Huber-Stearns et al. 2022; Edgeley and Paveglio 2024). Efforts to promote community-level adaptation have long centered on place-based, tailored approaches that reflect local contexts. However, pressure to adapt faster under increasingly hazardous conditions has led to policy and management changes that often de-center or are less responsive to community contexts, leading to outcomes that sometimes compromise the effectiveness of nuanced local wildfire adaptation approaches. Fluctuations in funding, staffing and resource availability to advance these efforts underscore the value of frequent reflection and adjustment to ensure that current approaches align with the social conditions under which wildfire adaptation is occurring (Davis et al. 2023; Nowell et al. 2025; Paveglio and Stasiewicz 2025). Documenting how varied approaches play out at the community level across different countries, cultures and environments, and intersect with changing policy, management and resources remains paramount for advancing international understandings of wildfire adaptation.

This editorial discusses opportunities to address four emerging challenges for community wildfire adaptation as pressure to demonstrate progress mounts internationally: (1) an increasingly circular wildfire economy that often detaches community capacity from mitigation progress, (2) a mismatch between public education, outreach, and messaging and information sought by community members, (3) emerging overreliance on regulatory approaches to influence collective action on private property, and (4) tensions surrounding modeling and mapping intended to guide community risk reduction planning. Observations shared here are drawn from recent community-based research efforts across the US West focused on wildfire adaptation in different social and ecological contexts. However, many of these challenges are present in other countries navigating wildfire risk, such as Australia, Canada, Portugal and the United Kingdom. Discussion below seeks to promote conversation about how communities can retain ownership or engagement in adaptation progress while navigating evolving technology, policy and management environments in international contexts.

Encouraging wildfire adaptation investments that improve community capacity

A recent uptick in funding available to support community adaptation in the US has prioritized hazardous fuels reduction and the development or update of core planning documents like Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPPs). Grant budgets often implicate contractors to lead proposed projects due to understaffing and limited capacity among both governmental and non-governmental applicants. This has fostered a circular wildfire adaptation economy that alternates between planning documents and implementation of document actions. A typical cycle might entail: (1) writing a grant to hire an environmental planning contractor to develop or revise a CWPP, (2) applying for funding to support fuels treatment activities outlined in the CWPP using a fuels contractor, then (3) upon completion of contracted fuels work, reinitiating the cycle by revising the CWPP. This process outsources or removes key elements of social adaptation such as leadership development and local networking, often unintentionally disengaging community members from planning and implementing activities beyond structured engagement opportunities. Contractors tasked with developing or updating planning documents often build committees or groups and hold public meetings to gather local input, but research suggests that the benefits of planning processes lie in informal and unstructured interactions, conversations and networking that occurs organically during planning processes (Brummel et al. 2010; Jakes et al. 2011; Hamilton et al. 2023).

Provision of grant funding to support wildfire risk reduction is positive, particularly in contexts where financial support is imperative for initiating progress. However, building local, sustained capacity for wildfire adaptation means transitioning away from growing dependence on outsourcing of adaptation activities to make progress (Meldrum et al. 2024; Paveglio and Shriner-Beaton 2025). Modifying the structure and requirements of current grant processes to begin better embedding local adaptation could include: (1) sustaining or creating community-based staff or liaison positions, (2) training and support for fuels treatments that empower the development of local risk reduction-based enterprises (e.g. small business loans to support growth and availability of local landscaping contractors for private property mitigation), (3) mentorship and training related to facilitation, planning processes and adaptation entrepreneurship, and (4) communal equipment for fuels work. Sustaining the impact of one-off or non-renewable grants may benefit from required maintenance plans for the work completed once grant funding ends to encourage applicants to think strategically about how grant funds can build longer-term capacity. Integrating local capacity into grants will also improve navigation of staff turnover at the organizations who often apply for these grants on behalf of communities, leaving projects in limbo during periods of transition. Finding intentional ways to build local involvement and capacity into grant process now is increasingly necessary for sustained community adaptation that can withstand fluctuations in funding, staff and capacity over time.

Moving beyond basic public education for cohesive wildfire risk reduction

The perceived absence of ‘social license’ as a barrier to hazardous fuels reduction progress has recently received renewed attention, often becoming a synonym for community acceptance (Moffat et al. 2016). Use of this term is declining among social scientists because it is often used to imply that wildfire risk reduction is delayed solely due to lack of public support or understanding, oversimplifying complex social, political, economic and ecological dynamics around vegetation management. One commonly proposed solution to garnering public support for fuels management is education, with the intent to bring public values and understandings in line with those of land managers (McCaffrey 2004). Yet, it is now rarely conflicts around the substance (or the ‘why’) of fuels management that emerge and benefit from enhanced education efforts, but instead questions about procedures to accomplish risk reduction (the ‘how’) (Daniels and Walker 2001; Paveglio and Edgeley 2023). Community members increasingly agree that actions to reduce wildfire risk are necessary, but they often need more detail about proposed approaches than is typically provided to assess approach suitability on landscapes that have personal meaning and community significance (Edgeley et al. 2026a, 2026b). Shifting education foci from basic fire ecology into fuels treatment decision-making contexts can reduce community-agency conflict and avoid exacerbating existing land management tensions.

Members of diverse publics are increasingly primed to be partners and collaborators in wildfire risk management. Moving beyond misconceptions of the public as uninformed requires greater transparency about how land management decisions are made in spaces where two-way conversations can take place. For example, residents interviewed in Parks, Arizona, supported hazardous fuels reduction, but had questions about how far in advance a prescribed fire or slash pile burning was decided upon, who made the approvals and how smoke was managed in the area (see Edgeley and Burnett 2025). Within these conversations, there is also an often-overlooked difference between tolerance and acceptance; a resident or community might tolerate smoke for extended periods of time but remain reserved about the timing or location of a prescribed or managed fire (Engebretson et al. 2016). Demonstrating how community values are incorporated or protected in risk reduction activities has also been shown to consistently improve public engagement, trust and support (Williams et al. 2018; Paveglio et al. 2019; Champ et al. 2022). One common example is consideration of residents’ aesthetic preferences in fuels treatment location and placement (e.g. Winter et al. 2002; Paveglio and Edgeley 2023). Continued investment in exploration of public attitudes towards risk reduction remains important for supporting more progressive fuels treatment activities; practitioners often hear from the most vocal individuals, who typically are not representative of the public at large. Education is a starting point (rather than an end point) in community-agency partnerships and requires layering with other community-based efforts to improve cohesive action.

Avoiding overreliance on regulation to resolve collective action issues

Regulatory mechanisms have become widely discussed approaches for overriding wildfire mitigation inaction on private property. Examples include local defensible space ordinances enforced with fines or liens (e.g. Payson, Arizona), mandatory fees in high-risk wildland–urban interface (WUI) areas to support risk assessments (e.g. Utah House Bill 48, passed in 2025) and requiring adherence to new building or WUI code standards in order to receive a permit to rebuild after wildfire (e.g. select Californian counties and municipalities). While interest in regulation often reveals good intentions, they are rarely a quick fix for large-scale social change because top-down approaches typically do not influence communities’ underlying relationships with wildfire. Regulation is most effective when residents already live in rule-driven community structures (e.g. Homeowners Associations) or areas where reliance on government is commonplace (Winter et al. 2009; Stidham et al. 2014; Steffey et al. 2020). Rural and unincorporated communities are generally unsupportive of top-down approaches that threaten independent lifestyles or require government involvement in private property decision-making (Edgeley et al. 2020; Paveglio et al. 2021). Misalignment of wildfire adaptation approaches with community conditions has long been a source of tension, distrust and inertia. Recent difficulty implementing regulatory mechanisms indicates that their use is not universally effective and may be better suited to small-scale, case-by-case implementation.

Exploring the suitability of regulatory-driven adaptation strategies requires careful introduction of a potenial approach with adequate time for input from affected residents and those responsible for local-level implementation. Providing opportunities to identify limitations or challenges to effective use can support integration of regulations into the existing constellation of adaptation activities already occurring, if appropriate. This might involve inviting local professionals to review implementation plans associated with regulations to proactively address place-based issues and nuance, which often takes the form of listening sessions, workshops, working groups, or advisory councils (e.g. state planning reviews after the Australian Black Saturday Fires; the Deschutes County, Oregon, Wildfire Mitigation Advisory Committee). Screening prospective regulation prior to implementation can support a balance between ambiguity and rigidity that accommodates local nuance while supporting broader consistency. It may also help reduce or remove ambiguity about the conditions under which a policy is implemented prior to widespread communication. Sudden or under-communicated introduction of regulations overrides opportunities for residents to understand why they are being asked to undertake actions, instead only telling them what they must do. These conditions can lead to misinterpretation of policy intent and may introduce or exacerbate conflict. While desirable, coproduction of regulation design and implementation requires longer timeframes and more upfront time investment to streamline implementation on the back end, conflicting with policy-making timelines and voting processes. Furthermore, regulation without provision of resources or capacity to enable compliance can create disparities between those with and without the skills or financial means to engage (Collins 2008; Ellery et al. 2023; Meldrum et al. 2024). Adaptation therefore cannot occur solely through regulation; where regulation is deemed necessary, it should be paired with voluntary, community-driven efforts.

Recognizing the limits of wildfire models in shaping community action

Novel wildfire modeling and related risk mapping of potential WUI fire behavior, risk and event-based scenarios (e.g. how structures might ignite each other, how retrofitting could change fire outcomes) has drawn interest from policy makers, practitioners and community groups (Price et al. 2025; Young et al. 2025; Fig. 1). Underlying these efforts is an assumption that better modelling will lead to better planning, and that model outputs like risk maps will subsequently motivate resident mitigation behaviors. However, it is not clear whether model outputs directly influence risk reduction activities. Modeling efforts have limited value if residents of properties within these higher-resolution studies are unwilling or unable to engage in fuels reduction, structure retrofitting, or other activities the model outputs indicate are beneficial. Additionally, conflict about model outputs between scientists and practitioners tasked with risk assessment or modeling and those living in modeled and mapped places continues to emerge, particularly regarding risk classification of private property (e.g. 2021 Oregon State Bill 762: see Casey 2025). This is particularly common in instances where outputs may be tied to financial consequences such as fees or insurance coverage, indicating limited public trust in wildfire models that may deter proactive risk reduction rather than enable it.

Models and related maps provide limited contributions to community wildfire adaptation if they cannot be merged with rigorous social science or their social limitations are not acknowledged. Evaluative research is needed that determines whether resident or community receipt of model outputs influence mitigative actions or broader behavioral changes and inquires how, if at all, model outputs change wildfire risk planning. Seeking opportunities to conduct this interdisciplinary work in teams with the capacity to navigate iterative rounds that document and respond to user needs (rather than generating an output and retroactively asking for input) can further improve practitioner and community engagement (Cleveland et al. 2024; Emard et al. 2024). The timing and saliency of model or map dissemination relative to community context is also important to consider; not all communities see value in these outputs or are comfortable with their generation and use (Paveglio and Edgeley 2023; Edgeley et al. 2024). Although deeper engagement may require extended timeframes to produce outputs, it can reduce delays and revisions later while encouraging more inclusive and engaged community planning methods, particularly in the context of CWPPs and similar strategic documents where risk maps are currently required.

Recentering community in wildfire adaptation

The four opportunities above collectively emphasize that proactive, place-based community engagement must drive wildfire adaptation progress, rather than intersect in stochastic and temporary ways in late stages of decision-making, in order for activities to be supported, adopted and implemented effectively. This is not a new observation in the wildfire social science literature, but one that must be re-centered and explored in new ways as the technology, policy and social dynamics surrounding community adaptation continue to mature internationally. Innovation in these spaces has allowed ideas about how adaptation might occur to evolve, yet it does not always translate to local progress, heightened understandings, or expanded capacity for wildfire risk reduction. Going beyond procedural, structured public engagement to prioritize emergent process-oriented approaches to adaptation is foundational to the evolution of community wildfire adaptation. Documenting how varied approaches play out at the community level across different countries, cultures and environments, and intersect with changing policy, management and resources remains paramount for advancing international understandings of wildfire adaptation.

Catrin Edgeley is an Associate Editor for the International Journal of Wildland Fire. This editorial was written as part of the Journal’s initiative to spotlight emerging topics and foster discussion within the wildland fire community.

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Investigators listed the fire’s cause on Inciweb, but did not release details on how they determined the cause. The fire’s latest update on Tuesday morning reported that containment is increasing while the fire’s growth continues to slow due to cooler temperatures and higher relative humidity.

“Crews were successful at tying in more of the fire perimeter to control lines along the north and northeast areas of the fire,” according to the latest update. “Firefighters continue to improve indirect and contingency lines ahead of the fire.”

Some incident personnel on Tuesday morning attended a procession in Modesto, California, for Ryan Cutter and Greg King, the two pilots who died in a helicopter crash while working the fire. The FAA’s initial incident notification said the helicopter, a Eurocopter AS32 Super Puma, crashed under unknown circumstances while on water bucket drops at the fire.

Personnel working the fire have attributed the increasing containment to several pack mules from the Shasta-Trinity National Forest delivering fire equipment and medical supplies to crews.

“These intelligent, strong animals provide invaluable support,” crews said. “Using pack mules allows helicopters to do other work, such as bucket drops; and mules can also be used in smoky conditions where a helicopter would not have good visibility to deliver supplies to a remote site.”

Read the Dome Fire’s Tuesday update here.