San Luis Obispo County is preparing for a dry summer season as cities update fire hazard zones and firefighters train to ensure they are in mental and physical shape for when fires inevitably spark.
Major efforts for fire training started on May 27 as the San Luis Obispo County Fire Service Training Officers Association, All Hazards Incident Management Team, and other local agency partners, conducted a full-scale wildland urban interface drill at Camp Roberts, a National Guard post just off Highway 101 in San Miguel.
According to SLO County Public Information Officer Ryan Grebe, representatives from Cal Fire SLO, Paso Robles, Templeton, Five Cities, Santa Margarita, Atascadero, Santa Maria, Cal Fire Monterey, Camp Roberts, and Santa Barbara County participated in the training.
“We’re working with our co-operators that we would see at vegetation fires throughout the county,” Grebe said. “It’s nice to get to work with them, to meet people, to see who’s going to be out there on the engines, and kind of get a chance to work together before we start running fires in the summer. It just makes it easier once we do get on an incident if you know the people you’ll be working with.”
Grebe said there’s a wide variety of drills the firefighters run through at Camp Roberts, including live and controlled structural fires—something that is new as of this year.
“We lit fire beneath structures out on Camp Roberts. There’s these structures that the military uses for training and they’re made out of non-combustible materials. There’s really no danger to the actual structures, but it’s a great training environment,” he said. “What we did is we lit fire in the grass beneath them and then deployed engines as if it was a real incident and said, ‘OK, you’re tasked with protecting these three structures. What do you do?'”
According to Grebe, each group that took on the challenge had different strategies, but all were successful in extinguishing the fires.
Considering the devastation of the LA fires in January, Grebe said these are essential skills to brush up on. Having sent several SLO County firefighters to the Palisades area, Grebe said the tactics are challenging and complex.
“It’s deploying lines quickly; it’s moving the engine in the right position; it’s if you’re going to use fire to fight fire, or if you’re going to use your water, and conserving your water, because you have a place to fill up after you use it,” Grebe listed. “You may not just have one house, you may be in charge of protecting five structures. … What structures are in the most danger? There’s a lot that goes into it. So anytime that we can get out and practice under live fire conditions, it’s really, really valuable to the people participating.”
Cities are also increasing efforts for fire prevention by updating fire hazard severity zone maps per the orders of the state fire marshal and overseen by local governments—such as the SLO, Morro Bay, and Grover Beach city councils have done in recent weeks.
According to Morro Bay’s May 27 staff report, the maps identify an area’s probability of burning and potential fire behavior related to fire history, vegetation, flame length, blowing embers, proximity to wildland, terrain, and weather. Updated maps adjust fire intensity scores based on the most extreme fire weather at a given location, considering temperature, humidity, and wind speed.
Grebe told New Times that from what he’s heard, the county is in for an active fire season, but it’s hard to say exactly when conditions will ramp up.
“The fields are drying out right now and then as we get periods of low humidities, high heat, and higher wind speeds—that’s that combination, that triple threat—that is really going to make for increased fire danger and rapid growth,” he said. Δ
This article appears in Pride 2025.