SAF Fire Management & Prescribed Burning 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Under the Incident Command System (ICS), who is responsible for overall management of a wildfire incident?
- Operations Section Chief
- Incident Commander (Correct answer)
- Safety Officer
- Planning Section Chief
Correct answer: Incident Commander
The Incident Commander has overall authority and responsibility for all aspects of the incident response, including the development and implementation of strategic decisions.
Question 2: Which fireline construction method involves removing all flammable material down to mineral soil?
- Cold trailing
- Scratch line
- Handline (Correct answer)
- Burnout
Correct answer: Handline
Handline construction involves removing fuels and duff down to mineral soil to create a fireline that stops fire spread, and is built manually by crews using hand tools.
Question 3: The Standard Firefighting Orders specify how many orders that firefighters must follow at all times?
- 5
- 8
- 10 (Correct answer)
- 18
Correct answer: 10
The 10 Standard Firefighting Orders are fundamental safety rules developed after the 1957 Mann Gulch Fire and form the basis of wildland firefighter safety training.
Question 4: In fire behavior modeling, the term 'rate of spread' (ROS) refers to:
- The number of spot fires per hour
- The speed at which the fire perimeter advances (Correct answer)
- The rate of crown fire initiation
- The hourly increase in fire intensity
Correct answer: The speed at which the fire perimeter advances
Rate of spread describes how quickly the fire's leading edge advances across the landscape, typically expressed in chains per hour or feet per minute.
Question 5: Which silvicultural system is most compatible with prescribed fire as a vegetation management tool in longleaf pine ecosystems?
- Shelterwood system (Correct answer)
- Clearcut system
- Selection system
- Seed tree system
Correct answer: Shelterwood system
The shelterwood system, which maintains an overstory of fire-tolerant longleaf pines while using prescribed fire to prepare seedbeds and control competing vegetation, is well-suited to longleaf pine management.
Question 6: When a prescribed burn escapes containment lines and becomes uncontrolled, it is reclassified as:
- A project fire
- A wildfire
- An escaped prescribed fire (Correct answer)
- A control burn
Correct answer: An escaped prescribed fire
Per federal and most state policy, when a prescribed fire exceeds its prescription and cannot be controlled, it is classified as an escaped prescribed fire, triggering a transition to suppression operations.
Question 7: The 'black line' technique in prescribed burning refers to:
- Mapping fire perimeters with GPS
- Pre-burning fuels adjacent to control lines to widen safe zones (Correct answer)
- Painting control lines on topographic maps
- Using smoke columns to judge fire intensity
Correct answer: Pre-burning fuels adjacent to control lines to widen safe zones
The black line technique involves burning fuels along control lines before igniting the main burn unit, creating a wider buffer of burned-over area that reduces the risk of fire crossing the line.
SAF Fire Management & Prescribed Burning 2
Under the Incident Command System (ICS), who is responsible for overall management of a wildfire incident?