Abandoned Campfires

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Scott 3

Scott 3

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Joined
Jan 17, 2016
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694
Came across an abandoned campfire yesterday that was fully going.  I called it into the office and they were going to send a ranger.  Around the same loop we came across a 2nd fire.  I couldn't believe it.  Called that one in as well.
 
It is actually a requirement in government campgrounds that a campfire has to be extinguished enough so that you could lay your hand on top of the coals and not feel warmth. Very few people know this and even fewer actually do it.
 
Usually it's because the fire wasn't doused with water. I have seen campers leave thinking that everything was under control, but a slight breeze would reignite the embers and the fire starts up again.  I have put out fires with water more than once after a camper left.
 
I spent a summer as a seasonal Corps of Engineer ?ranger? (aka Park Technician). Every weekend one of my main jobs was going around putting out campfires people had left. I was to put out any campfire left unattended, not just the ones where the campers had completely left, including those where they left to go fishing or some other task. Let?s just say that after I put out a campfire, no other fires would be lit in the campfire ring since it was usually swimming in inches of water! Our ?real? rangers took an exceedingly dim view of unattended fires since they had to fight far too many fires resulting from a blown spark. We were very direct with folks checking in, and they could never say they weren?t warned, but I still got some irate visits. Tough luck dude.
 
I've saw where a bag of un-burnt charcoal briquettes spontaneously ignited after it got wet.

Campers sometimes dump them into fire-rings when they packup to go home...
 
I have never had a fire I put out re-light. but I have found that it was still hot when I returned to the fire ring in the AM... What was BLACK when I doused it was white.

Though it did nto flare up. it could have  And I seriously douse the fire.. The idea of an unattended fire..... Well my job included saying "9-1-1 where is the emergency".
 
SargeW said:
Usually it's because the fire wasn't doused with water.
Click to expand...

I wish I could agree. :)

I find it's often because people just leave the fire blazing when they leave... I've often been at campgrounds where my wife and I are the only ones who actually put any effort towards extinguishing our fire... very sad...
 
From the stacks of wood I think these were left to burn.  I always douse my fires.
 
this reminds me of by days as a boy scout.  I think we were camping at Carolina Bach state park, in NC...but I could be wrong...
anyway, my buddy and I were tasked with putting out the fire as we were breaking camp.  there wasn't water nearby so we had to tote it in a bucket.  We smothered and doused and drowned that fire, and the adult checking us kept putting his hand down into the ground...as in like digging it down into the ashes... (as I remember it anyway)and shaking his head nope, do it again.  That pit was a mud hole and we were still having to go for more water and digging around in the muck trying to find warm coals.
even to this day a whole lot of moons later... as an adult looking at this from the safety perspective knowing full well the why behind all of that... I can now see that the first time or maybe two, we really did need to do it again (we were kids trying to short-cut it)....but after that...I still find the whole thing as ridiculous.  It was kind of a "zero tolerance law" kind of thing.  One of the reasons scouting soured for me back then and I quit.
 
I was camping this weekend. The site was cheap, so I reserved through Monday even though we were leaving Sunday. This way we could sleep late and take our time getting on the road.

We woke up after most people left, and were one of two groups still there in a campground with some 35 sites.

Within view of my RV there were 5 active campfires, completely unattended.

People woke up, started a fire, and drove away.
 
Probably left smouldering from the night before and restarted to heat the morning coffee. There is no fixing stupid, all the coverage about forest fires and careless campers yet it goes on and on.
 
The state recreation area near me hires interns in the summer to clean up campsites. As soon as a site is vacated, these kids pull in , pick up any trash and shovel out the firepits (steel rings on concrete slabs).
 
After 50+ years... the Campfire rings here at Huntington Beach are to be removed in the interest of public safety after the City was sued several times when kids fell into them.

Sadly......I'm afraid "Campfires" will be outlawed everywhere pretty soon....

You know what they say !......  "As California goes...so goes the nation"  :-\



 
"when kids fell into them"... I tripped backwards over one a few years ago.  I pulled a muscle in my leg trying to keep my balance.  DW and daughters had a great laugh watching me flip backwards.
 
OBX said:
From the stacks of wood I think these were left to burn.  I always douse my fires.
Click to expand...
I was at a campground in the Adirondacks once and we saw a family packing up to leave right next to us. They had a huge stack of fire wood so we kept an eye on them because often times people leave their firewood and we needed more. Right before they pulled out, they put all the wood in the fire pit and started a fire. I just don't get it. It was a chilly morning and we hadn't started a fire so we brought our chairs over and made breakfast on their fire and sat there instead of our own site.
 
RVMommaTo6 said:
I was at a campground in the Adirondacks once and we saw a family packing up to leave right next to us. They had a huge stack of fire wood so we kept an eye on them because often times people leave their firewood and we needed more. Right before they pulled out, they put all the wood in the fire pit and started a fire. I just don't get it. It was a chilly morning and we hadn't started a fire so we brought our chairs over and made breakfast on their fire and sat there instead of our own site.
Click to expand...
That was a really selfish camper. Not only did they leave a live fire going in a campground as they left, but they had to use up the wood so someone else couldn?t! I routinely leave wood in my site on the few occasions we buy some. We just aren?t big fire people, so when we do buy some it isn?t uncommon to have some left over.
 
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