Have you ever thrown an old Christmas tree on a fire? No, I’m the only one who engages in such childish acts while sitting around a campfire drinking beer? Well, it’s a lot of fun. You don’t know what you’re missing, but once you watch this video you’ll get a pretty good idea, minus the beers.
Turns out that fluorescent red stuff that planes drop on forest fires isn’t all-natural. A federal judge has ordered that the U.S. Forest Service complete an adequate environmental assessment of just how bad for the eco-system the toxic spray is. The USFS will continue using the fire retardant this summer, and will have to complete their survey by 2011.
“If a farmer took a 3,000-gallon truckload of liquefied fertilizer and dumped it in a creek, that farmer would be in jail in a heartbeat,” Stahl said. “But when the Forest Service does it, everybody looks the other way because it is a war on fire.”
via Get Outdoors
