Yosemite’s Mariposa Grove reopens as Washburn Fire winds down

The Mariposa Grove of giant sequoia trees, one of the most popular and breathtaking landmarks in Yosemite National Park, reopened to the public Wednesday morning, nearly four weeks after a major wildfire broke out nearby.

The Washburn Fire was 97% contained, fire officials reported Wednesday, having burned 4,886 acres. The blaze, which began July 7, had more than 1,600 firefighters at its peak. But Wednesday, only 65 remained to mop up.

“It looks great. We are super-excited. At the shuttle bus stop there were probably 200 people waiting to get in this morning,” said Yosemite spokesman Scott Gediman. “The fire came very close, but the sequoias look great. We’re so thankful.”

When the Washburn Fire was first discovered, it sparked fears of an environmental catastrophe. Massive lightning-sparked fires over the past two years farther south in Sequoia National Park and Sequoia National Forest killed between 10,000 and 14,000 giant sequoias — nearly 20% of all the remaining wild giant sequoias on Earth.

But the news from the Washburn Fire has been nearly all good: After a major attack from firefighters early in the blaze, not one of the roughly 500 giant sequoias at the Mariposa Grove, some of which tower more than 200 feet tall and are more than 2,000 years old, died in the fire. No homes in the nearby Wawona community burned. There were no injuries or deaths.

The air quality in Yosemite on Wednesday was good, Gediman noted, and all the park’s entrances were open.

In fact, none of the facilities at the Mariposa Grove, including interpretive panels, restrooms, trails, wooden boardwalks, water systems and other features that were replaced four years ago as part of a $40 million renovation effort, suffered any damage from the fire.

“I think there’s one 25 mph sign on the road into the grove that partly burned,” said Garrett Dickman, a Yosemite forest ecologist and sequoia expert. “It really is astounding.”

The Mariposa Grove’s sequoias — first set aside for protection by Abraham Lincoln in 1864 — are among the largest living things on earth, reaching up to 285 feet tall, with bark more than a foot thick. Individual trees standing in the grove today stood there when Julius Caesar ruled the Roman Empire, and Alexander the Great led armies through Western Asia.

Dickman and other fire experts say that three things led to the successful outcome from the fire. When the fire started there were no other major blazes in California, so a large number of firefighters, engines, helicopters and other equipment were available. Second, the weather was not extreme. Temperatures were warm, but not searing, and winds were moderate mostly.

And most important, he noted, Yosemite crews have conducted 21 controlled burns in and around the Mariposa Grove since 1971. Those recreated natural conditions that occurred centuries ago when lightning strikes and burning by native tribes made fire a common part of the environment in the Sierra. The controlled burns and some moderate thinning of smaller fir trees removed dead wood and brush from the forest floor that otherwise could have caused the Washburn Fire to burn much hotter and more lethally to the big trees.

“Some of this was luck, and some was preparation,” Dickman said.

When the flames came to the grove, they slowed and stayed closer to the ground, he noted.

Crews set up a sprinkler system to protect the Grizzly Giant, which is 209 feet tall and believed to be the oldest tree in the grove, at roughly 2,700 years old. They also set up sprinklers near a historic cabin where Galen Clark, the park’s first ranger, lived more than 150 years ago.

Visitors to the grove now will see burn marks on several of the big trees, and burned forests of sugar pine and fir trees around the Wawona Road, Dickman said.

In recent weeks, the U.S. Forest Service announced emergency plans to cut red tape and accelerate controlled burns in giant sequoia groves across the Sierra Nevada.

Shuttle buses into the grove were running Wednesday morning. The park’s southern entrance at Highway 41 was open, and the historic Wawona Hotel and nearby Wawona campgrounds also were open.

Several trails on the Mariposa Grove’s edges remain temporarily closed, including the the Washburn Trail (between the welcome plaza and arrival area); the western portion of the Perimeter Trail (from the Galen Clark Tree to near the Grizzly Giant Loop Trail);  and the trail from the Mariposa Grove toward Wawona.

Meanwhile, crews also continued to make progress on another fire nearby, the Oak Fire, which was 81% contained at 19,244 acres. That fire started July 22 and burned between the town of Mariposa and El Portal, just south of Highway 140. The Oak Fire burned 127 structures, mostly in the Midpines area. But Wednesday, all evacuation orders were lifted, and Highway 140 from Mariposa into Yosemite’s western entrance was open.

Because of the fires, Yosemite Superintendent Cecily Muldoon set up counseling sessions for park employees this week at the Mariposa County Fairgrounds and Wawona Community Center.

“t’s been a very rough month with the destruction wrought by the Oak fire on our colleagues and our community, along with the trauma of the Washburn fire on those who were evacuated,” Muldoon wrote in a note to the staff, “not to mention some days of terrible air quality for all of us. We are continuing to explore ways to help those who have suffered losses.”