Getting Ready for Fire Season: Sawyer Camp Trail Closure June 12-13 for Emergency Training Exercise

The entire Sawyer Camp Trail, from the Skyline Entrance to Hillcrest, will be closed Tuesday and Wednesday, June 12-13, for public safety during a fire-fighting exercise Calfire will hold on the Peninsula Watershed for first responders. 

Calfire announced tentative plans for the  training session at a recent reunion of firefighters, police officers, park rangers, watershed keepers and other first responders, hosted every year by the SFPUC Natural Resources Division. But, as in previous years, dates for this kind of activity depend on the condition of the grasses, weather, winds, and other factors that are not predictable well in advance. If current dates are postponed for any of those reasons, we will post updates on this blog.  

As the second largest landowner on the Peninsula, the SFPUC is constantly on the watch throughout the 23,000-acre watershed and some 30 miles of pipeline right of way for potential fires and other disasters. Conditions are changing, Natural Resources director Tim Ramirez told the crowd at the Pulgas Temple  lunch time gathering. “Every year seems to be different, and the fire season is getting longer.”

The SFPUC routinely teams with neighboring agencies on day-to-day issues of trail management, tree clearances and public safety as well as sudden fires, injuries, and other emergencies.  Partner agencies already have access to the routes they could need at any time.  And our watershed keepers—trained responders as well—help with fires or other disasters on neighboring lands and come with emergency drinking water vehicles when needed.  “Those are times when people really come together,” said acting watershed manager John Fournet. 

The Pulgas event is a standing occasion to renew bonds and get acquainted with newcomers. “This way,” Fournet said, “we already know each other when something happens.”