Connect with Banff to save it from Canada's wildfires

The work of the loggers was unmistakable.

Flanked by dense forests, the mile-long stretch of land of 81 acres on the mountainside had been almost completely stripped. Only scattered trees were still standing, while a few thin felled trunks had been left behind. A path dug by logging trucks was visible under a light covering of snow.

Tree harvesting would be common in a commercial forest - but this was in Banff, the Canadian capital. most famous national park. Clearcutting was once unimaginable in this green jewel of the Canadian Rockies, where the long-standing policy was to strictly suppress all fire and preserve every tree.

But face to a growing threat In the event of wildfires, national park rangers are increasingly turning to loggers to create fire guards: buffers to prevent wildfires from spreading into the rest of the park and neighboring towns.

"If you were to have a very intense, fast-spreading wildfire, that gives fire managers options," said David Tavernini, a fire and vegetation expert at Parks Canada, the federal agency that manages national parks, walking on the soft ground of the cleared forest. .

ImageDavid Tavernini, a fire and vegetation expert at Parks Canada, at a fire ranger in Yoho National Park, near Banff.Credit...Amber Bracken for The New York Times

Still reeling from its worst wildfire season on record last year, Canada now faces the rapid start of a new one. The so-called zombie fires, which smoldered beneath the snow-covered ground during the winter, came to life and forced thousands of people to flee affected towns and villages in Western Canada.