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Zinke, Perdue Visit Carr Fire Areas

Marc Albert

Two members of President Trump’s cabinet received a sobering taste of the power of nature Monday as they toured ruins in and around Redding, where the Carr Fire is blamed for taking eight lives and destroying more than a thousand homes.

Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke spoke to reporters on the tarmac of the Forest Service’s Northern Operations Center, near the municipal airport in Redding. He stood in front of an old military transport plane still actively used to drop smoke jumpers. Zinke described what was left of high tension electrical lines after a so-called fire-whirl ripped through the area.

“Metal, that was designed for 200 mile an hour winds, it was picked up, removed out of the foundations and crumpled like an aluminum can,” Zinke said.

Zinke’s department oversees the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service.

His colleague, Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue agreed with Zinke that fire risk can be reduced by thinning forests. Perdue’s department oversees the U.S. Forest Service.

“When we talk about forest management many people misunderstand that we’re talking about clearcutting, that’s not the case at all,” Perdue said.

“We’re talking about prescribed burns in a safe period of time in the year where we can reduce the fuel load, where these fires just don’t take off and get so hot and so devastating, creating their own weather systems.”

Zinke said that in the wake of wildfire, restoration efforts should avoid planting vegetation that burns at high temperatures, singling out manzanita.

The two were joined by local Republican Congressman Doug LaMalfa.