The nearly 200,000 acre Funny River Fire started just over one year before the Card Street Fire, seemingly prepping Kenai Peninsula residents for a more streamlined fire response.
Brenda Ahlberg with the Kenai Peninsula Borough’s Office of Emergency management said the intensity of the Card Street Fire immediately peaked since it began in a subdivision.
Ahlberg: “So the immediate messaging was to evacuate and the importance of that evacuation ramped up. I think it was also just as effective if not more so than last year, people understood the process, understood who they needed to be listening to, whether it be KSRM or Rapid Notify, the importance of being registered on Rapid Notify so they could receive those messages, and also the importance of being ready in the event that they needed to be evacuated.”
Many residents that KSRM spoke with during the Card Street Fire stated they had prepared after 2014’s Funny River Fire.
Ahlberg said that homeowners fire-wising their properties saved homes this year.
The Borough’s Office of Emergency Management also expanded their information reach with an information hotline which will extend to future emergencies Ahlberg said.
Ahlberg: “Not only during fire response but will be available for other types of disaster responses on the Kenai Peninsula, as well as the blog account that we started with this wildland fire. That will end up being used for other responses: flood, river watch, ice jamming, earthquake or volcanoe, whatever those major responses in the future that we’re going to be involved in.
Agencies on the Office of Emergency Management’s blog are able to post directly to it, eliminating the middle man.
She added that the fire response between agencies seemed streamlined as well this year.