View along the road to the Lolo Peak Trailhead in the Lolo National Forest, Montana. Image by Sarah Sunu.

Wildfire Field Trip for Scientists and Journalists

Longer, more intense, and more hazardous wildfire seasons are forcing communities to ask tough questions about the long-term implications of these changes for their lives and livelihoods. COMPASS hosted a wildfire field trip in Montana to bring scientists and local journalists together to talk about what the future of fire holds for people and environment, and viable solutions for coexisting with wildfire

In October 2019, COMPASS hosted a field trip for Montana journalist and scientists studying different facets of wildfire in Montana – everything from fire ecology, to water quality, to recreation and human behavior — to help bridge gaps between wildfire science and decision-making in the state. We learned that, while national media attention around wildfires had increased in recent years, local journalists often don’t have the same resources and access to scientists, even as communities face decisions about how to handle longer, more intense, and more hazardous wildfire seasons in their backyards. We saw a need and an opportunity to connect local journalists to local scientists studying wildfire and its impacts on nature, people, and systems. 

We began with an afternoon training session for eight scientists, and brought in two journalist experts to help identify their core messages and practice how to share them in a field setting. The scientists self-organized and developed short ‘pair presentations’ tailored to specific sites along the field trip that illustrated key points. That evening, we held a social gathering for the scientists with five local journalists that we’d invited for the field trips, then the next morning, we set out for a half-day excursion to the Lolo Peak Trailhead in the Lolo National Forest. This area was in the heart of the Lolo Peak Fire, which impacted local residents with evacuations and smoke for over a month in the summer of 2017.

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What was useful about this event, was the diversity of colleagues on the scientist side. We’re all thinking about wildfire, but I found it really useful to have scientists who are working on wildfire from multiple perspectives involved. It allowed the journalists to ask a broader range of questions and get answers right then from people doing the work. That helped me appreciate the breadth and the scope of a story that a journalist is interested in going after.

– Dr. Phil Higuera, fire ecologist

 

It was incredible to have such open access to these scientists, especially in a format where they felt comfortable to share about their work. It can be tough for scientists to speak candidly about their research, particularly if they’re working for a federal agency, so it was great to have that immediate sense of rapport.

– Amanda Eggert, journalist

 

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