Fire can be good or bad depending on many factors. It can certainly be useful in ecosystems such as pine savannah’s where fire can act as a necessary part of a regenerative process. But as with all transformational forces, the location, timing, and intensity of a fire can make a huge difference to how good or bad it is.

If you work with fire we encourage you to seek basic training to ensure you know how to plan a safe burn and that you have the tools and equipment to manage it properly. (If you are interested in training please get in touch with TIDE, we run training sessions annually.)

Here are four important tips to consider when planning a burn from Mario Muschamp – TIDE Terrestrial Manager:

“Burn with a plan to save life and land”

“First and foremost, as a person using fire, your priority is the protection of life and property. If you don’t plan properly, you will be impacting life and property.”

“Make it a date to burn early or late.”

“Try to burn when the temperatures are coolest so you don’t get that intense fire behaviour, that will be harder for you to control and it has a better chance of that fire escaping.
You want to burn it out early so you can catch the kind of weather conditions you want so you ensure that your fire doesn’t escape.”

“If the fuel dry, you will cry!”

If the fuel is a little wet? You will have the best harvest yet. If the fuel is too dry, then the fire intensity is going to be high and then that will have certainly negative impacts on the yield from your crops.

“Before you start it, make sure you can manage it!”

You don’t want to put fire on the ground if you don’t have the necessary human resources and equipment and weather conditions to ensure that you’ll be able to manage that fire properly.

If you want, start it. Make sure you can manage it!

Following these tips can help reduce the risk of loss of life or property caused by escape fire.