Frenzen, co-chair of the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition’s communications committee, is gearing up to install the wildfire detection camera at the top of Tesuque Peak — as soon as the lingering snow permits.
It’s no ordinary camera: The pan-tilt-zoom camera from ALERTWest, which manages a network of such cameras, has powerful magnification and can see in infrared. It will be scanning the area for plumes of smoke. It can see 25 miles in the daylight and 50 miles at night. Its live feed will be transmitted to a 24/7 monitoring center in California, where artificial intelligence will detect signs of wildfire, and human technicians will verify the risk and alert emergency response.
Frenzen thinks the camera can help in local firefighting efforts by improving response times and increasing situational awareness — better protecting critical economic and environmental resources in the forests around Santa Fe as New Mexico prepares for longer fire seasons.
The camera feed also will be accessible to the public.
“Santa Fe hasn’t really experienced one of these crises,” Frenzen said, referring to catastrophic wildfire. “We haven’t had an earthquake; we haven’t had a hurricane; we haven’t had a major fire. We’ve been living kind of peacefully in this little neck of the woods for a long time without these kinds of disasters, and fire is likely to be the disaster we have to face.”
Tesuque Peak affords a 360-degree view of Santa Fe’s wildland urban interface, Frenzen said, and is outfitted with Internet and power — utilities that lower the cost of installation. The camera itself costs $3,000, along with about $6,000 per year in operating costs for software, 24/7 monitoring and other expenses.
Part of the motivation is personal, Frenzen said. The landscape around his family cabin in Nutrioso, Ariz., was stripped by the 2011 Wallow Fire — the largest fire in Arizona’s history.
The flames burned deep into the land around the cabin, turning trails into piles of rock, Frenzen said. Beyond the environmental impacts, the region’s economy was devastated; businesses shut down, and his own property lost significant value.
“A lot of people don’t appreciate just how devastating the aftereffects of a catastrophic fire [are],” Frenzen said. “... The terrain, parts of it look like Santa Fe — it’s mixed conifer at 7,000 to 10,000 feet. It’s the same kind of ecosystem.”
He added, “Living here in Santa Fe, I know firsthand what these trails are going to look like if they’re allowed to burn the way the Wallow Fire burned.”
Frenzen said the cost of the camera equipment and its first year of operations is covered by the Santa Fe Community Foundation and the Santa Fe-Pojoaque Soil and Water Conservation District. He considers the project a “technology demonstration” but hopes it will have long-term effects — that another entity will keep the camera running after the initial funding is gone and other groups will put up cameras of their own.
Champe Green, treasurer of the soil and water conservation district, said the camera is “one more tool in the toolbox” to detect wildfires more quickly.
The organization, which contributed $5,000 to buy and install the camera, was founded in 1941 with the mission of preventing wildfires, protecting watersheds and limiting erosion.
Green, a resident of Eldorado, said there’s significant concern about fire risk in his community. In dry spring months, the winds get “pretty ferocious,” he said, adding fuels have built up in the Santa Fe National Forest.
He thinks the camera could quell some of those concerns — or at least increase public awareness.
“People might see smoke and they don’t know where to turn; they’re concerned and anxious about it,” Green said. “The fire camera and its software will provide a way for people to understand what’s going on, quickly.”
When it comes to fire cameras, New Mexico isn’t the “new kid on the block,” Frenzen said — there’s more than a thousand cameras monitored by ALERTWest around California and several in other Western states.
“A single camera anywhere — in Santa Fe or Tesuque Peak or wherever it is — is just a start,” Frenzen said. “It has practical value, but it also has symbolic value. There’s a technology here that’s tried and true, and we need to protect our communities, our forests, our economies.
“But more than one camera will really be required to actually create the system we need,” he added, “and, I honestly think, we deserve.”
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