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Interlaken Fire updates have mentioned “suppression and repair” efforts. These are actions taken by the firefighters that limit the damage that suppression actions may have caused the landscape. The next step in minimizing wildfire damage to the landscape is to implement longer-term rehabilitation efforts to repair damage caused by the fire. These efforts begin after the fire is out and continue for several years. Rehabilitation focuses on the lands unlikely to recover naturally from wildland fire damage. To address these damaged areas a Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) team is dispatched to the burned area to determine the need for and to prescribe and implement treatments on Federal Land to minimize threats to life or property resulting from the effects of a fire or to stabilize and prevent unacceptable degradation to natural and cultural resources.

The Interlaken Fire will welcome the expertise of a BAER team to the area this week. BAER teams are staffed by specially trained professionals: hydrologists, soil scientists, engineers, biologists, vegetation specialists, archeologists, and others who rapidly evaluate the burned area and prescribe emergency stabilization treatments. A BAER assessment usually begins before the wildfire has been fully contained.