In 2017, wildfire neared Roslyn; 9 years later, the town burned 500+ acres to prevent future fires

In Washington, a team of igniters are walking across the forest with canisters filled with a mixture of diesel fuel and gasoline. They walk in parallel, lighting grasses and shrubs, moving forward as flames spread in the back, and thousands of pine needles combust into a smoke show. At the same time, more than a dozen people are working to ensure that the blaze stays under control. What is being done is a prescribed burn on a forested ridge above a small town, Roslyn, that was nearly wiped out by a wildfire a few years ago, as per a report by Stateline.The spectre of wildfire is increasingly haunting the existence of communities throughout the West and this work could point to a new model of living with the phenomenon.A fiery landscapeBefore white settlers arrived in the late 1800s, the forests in this part of Washington burned roughly every decade. Fires were sparked by lightning or set by local tribes to manage the land. The ponderosa pine forests in the area thrive on fire, which mostly spares mature trees but opens the understory for lush regrowth that feeds many animals. For more than a century, state and federal land managers kept the fire away. Smokey Bear taught generations...