The Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Fire Program has dispatched wildland firefighters to help with fire management efforts across the Rocky Mountains, the west coast and the Pacific Northwest.
Iowa DNR staff and other Iowa-based firefighters are members of hand crews in Colorado and South Dakota. Other agency staff are assisting the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service fire engines in Wyoming.
One Iowa DNR engine and crew is assigned to southern California. Support specialists and Emergency Medical Technicians from Iowa are supporting efforts in northern California and Oregon.
“Iowa has gotten a reprieve from several years of drought conditions with heavy rainfalls the past month, but the western United States has seen just the opposite,” said Ryan Harr, Iowa DNR Fire Program supervisor.