Wildfires are devastating. They tear up the natural habitats for a lot of wildlife, destroy businesses and people’s livelihoods, and force family’s to abandon their homes. There is no doubt that wildfires have been increasing in frequency and intensity throughout the years, causing more and more damage each summer. Burns are still a major part of nature when at a reasonable level, and though terrible, their aftermath can often include a sense of beauty.
Usually I would point out how wildfires can create new terrain for animals to create habitats, take down cumbersome dead trees and make room for new, fresh plant life, and allow for harmful brush and disease to burn away. But there’s also an aspect of wildfires that creates some pretty remarkable skiing.
I’ve skied a few burn scars throughout my days, and I can confidently say that they’re pretty cool to ski through. The lack of vegetation creates some playful open tree runs that allow for some pretty fast skiing and often fill in with some pretty deep powder. This ski vlog from Megan Dingman does a pretty sweet job at demonstrating how cool those burn scars can be.
“Welcome to my new series! We went backcountry skiing in an Utah wildfire burn scar and found some excellent snow along the way.”
Image Credit: Megan Dingman via YouTube