ST. GEORGE, Utah — The Bureau of Land Management will be implementing Stage 1 Fire Restriction in southern Utah on all BLM-managed lands, with the restrictions applying to Washington, Iron, Kane, Garfield, and Beaver counties.
The restrictions begin at 12:01 a.m. Friday and will remain in effect until the bureau rescinds them.
Under the restrictions, the following actions are prohibited:
- Building or maintaining any open fire or campfires using solid fuels, or any ash-producing fuel.
- Smoking, except within a vehicle or enclosed area.
- Grinding, cutting, and welding of metal.
- Operating or using any internal combustion engine without a spark-arresting device properly installed and in effective working order.
BLM officials also ask target shooters to know their ammunition before visiting public lands, as packaging may not indicate the presence of steel in the bullet, especially in military surplus or foreign-made ammunition.
Bullets can be tested for containing steel with the use of a magnet. Orange or red painted tips on ammunition could also indicate tracer ammunition, which can ignite flammable substances, such as dry grass, upon contact.
To help prevent wildfires, officials say the public can:
- Fully extinguish campfires and avoid building fires when winds are 15 mph or higher.
- Avoid target shooting in hot, dry and windy conditions.
- Choose a target shooting backstop free of rocks and dry grass – any bullet hitting rocks can create a spark.
- Avoid cutting, welding or grinding of metal in areas of dry vegetation.
- Keep trailer chains lifted above the ground – dragging chains can create sparks.
- Avoid parking a hot vehicle over dry grass.
- Maintain tires, wheels and bearing on trailers to prevent mechanical failure.
- Check off-highway vehicle exhaust system yearly to ensure the spark arrester is mounted securely and is qualified.
- Fully extinguish and properly dispose of cigarettes.
