WASHINGTON — Bipartisan U.S. senators from the West, including Idaho Republicans Mike Crapo and Jim Risch, are urging the Biden administration to coordinate across agencies to help Western states with shortages of fuel that are preventing firefighters from using aircraft to fight wildfires.
“We are concerned that fuel shortages could lead to the grounding of federal, state, and contracted aircrafts and hurt the ability for initial fire attack and further devastate communities near the growing number of wildfires,” Risch and Crapo, along with Democratic senators from California, Oregon and Washington, wrote in a letter to four Cabinet secretaries.
The shortage in fuel is due to several issues, one being a shortage of truck drivers for transportation. In addition, due to high temperatures, oil refineries, for safety reasons, cannot operate at full capacity.
The letter was addressed to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
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