The National Wildfire Coordinating Group provides national leadership to enable interoperable wildland fire operations among federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial partners. Primary objectives include: Establish national interagency wildland fire operations standards. Recognize that the decision to adopt standards is made independently by the NWCG members and communicated through their respective directives systems; Establish wildland fire position standards, qualifications requirements, and performance support capabilities (e.g. training courses, job aids) that enable implementation of NWCG standards; Support the National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy goals: to restore and maintain resilient landscapes; create fire adapted communities; and respond to wildfires safely and effectively; Establish information technology (IT) capability requirements for wildland fire; and Ensure that all NWCG activities contribute to safe, effective, and coordinated national interagency wildland fire operations. The challenge of minimizing the impacts of smoke on the public while expanding the role of fire in land management has never been greater, as air quality standards tighten and the wildland-urban interface expands with people looking to live in natural environments with clean air. Recent dramatic increases in the average number of acres burned by wildfire per year have led to increased awareness that wildfire smoke impacts are a reality that must be addressed. Prescribed fire, a vital tool to improve ecosystem health and lessen the potential impacts of wildfire, is gaining support even among unlikely allies such as clean air agencies. But this tentative support will only continue and expand if fire practitioners commit to continuously learning and applying the best science and methods for protecting air quality as well as emphasizing public communications and outreach to address concerns. In the near future, changes in climate leading to shifting ecosystems and fire regimes will provide new challenges. This edition of the "Smoke Management Guide for Prescribed Fire" builds on previous versions with updated knowledge of fire and air quality science, policy, and tools. New concepts presented for the first time include chapters on smoke management communications, public perceptions of smoke from wildland fire, wildland fire and climate change, and the practical use of meteorological tools and indices for smoke management. This guidebook will serve to educate current and future generations of fire practitioners and smoke managers by building upon the good work of earlier efforts.

The Wildland Fire Incident Management Field Guide is a revision of what used to be called the Fireline Handbook, PMS 410-1. This guide has been renamed because, over time, the original purpose of the Fireline Handbook had been replaced by the Incident Response Pocket Guide, PMS 461. As a result, this new guide is aimed at a different audience, and it was felt a new name was in order.

Landowners and managers, municipalities, the logging and livestock industries, and conservation professionals all increasingly recognize that setting prescribed fires may reduce the devastating effects of wildfire, control invasive brush and weeds, improve livestock range and health, maintain wildlife habitat, control parasites, manage forest lands, remove hazardous fuel in the wildland-urban interface, and create residential buffer zones. In this practical and helpful manual, John R. Weir, who has conducted more than 720 burns in four states, offers a step-by-step guide to the systematic application of burning to meet specific land management needs and goals.

Managing wildland fire in the U.S. is a challenge increasing in complexity & magnitude. The goals & actions presented in this report encourage a proactive approach to wildland fire to reduce its threat. Five major topic areas on the subject are addressed: the role of wildland fire in resource management; the use of wildland fire; preparedness & suppression; wildland/urban interface protection; & coordinated program management. Also presented are the guiding principle that are fundamental to wildland fire management & recommendations for fire management policies. Photos, graphs, & references.

This state-of-knowledge review about the effects of fire on air quality can assist land, fire, and air resource managers with fire and smoke planning, and their efforts to explain to others the science behind fire-related program policies and practices to improve air quality. Chapter topics include air quality regulations and fire; characterization of emissions from fire; the transport, dispersion, and modeling of fire emissions; atmospheric and plume chemistry; air quality impacts of fire; social consequences of air quality impacts; and recommendations for future research.