The "Big Blow-up"

On November 25, 1950, a brave hurricane crossed the Appalachians into the western Adirondacks where, in a single day, it blew down more than 800,000 acres of forest.  This storm system, dubbed “The Big Blow,” sparked the largest debate since the foundation of the park in the 1890s over whether lumber companies should be allowed to conduct salvage—harvesting the millions of fallen trees to decrease fire risk in the park and to protect our country from Korea.  This dispute was aptly named “The Big Blow-up.”

Still haunted by the fires of 1905 caused by sparky rail roads and large amounts of brush left behind by sloppy forestry practices, the pro-salvage advocates initially won the debate.  While the Conservation Department officially insisted that the decision to remove the fallen trees stemmed from the fire danger, the fact that the spruce (the most prized species for lumber that was in short supply by this time) was the most strongly affected tree in the park seems to have played more heavily in their decision.

The lumber industry had attempted more than 30 times to gain access to the trees in the preserve since the founding of the park, and the Big Blow gave them the opportunity to change the tone of their argument: rather than harming the park by harvesting valuable trees, they were “saving” it from the strong possibility of its spontaneous combustion.  Because of the severity of the threat of fire, the Conservation Department bypassed the constitutional amendment procedure and gave lumber companies permission to salvage the trees.  Voices of dissent from environmental groups urged the Conservation department to give the document stronger wording to prevent the lumber companies from turning this special circumstance into the norm.  They eventually settled on limiting the trees collected to “fallen or seriously damaged trees to the extent necessary to provide for the safety and preservation of the Preserve.”

These fears proved to be well founded.  By 1951, less than a year into the salvage operation, the Conservation Department began running articles in New York Conservationist criticizing the limit on logging in the park and advocating for more widespread access for lumber companies.  By 1952, a proposal to open 70 percent of the park to logging was being seriously considered.

Luckily, the salvage operation didn’t pay out as much as the lumber companies were hoping.  By 1954, most of the spruce knocked down by the Big Blow had decayed too much to be sent to the mills.  Also, the spruce that had been extracted had flooded the market and significantly lowered the price of spruce, limiting returns on its extraction.  In the end, only a little more than half of the contracts offered to the companies were completed and nearly a fourth were never begun.

Today, scientists acknowledge that clearing out the debris was not ecologically the right decision.  Storms and disturbance play an important role in the health and succession of forests.  Thus, removing the fallen trees likely stemmed from a fear of the past and the promise of future financial security.  On a positive note, at least the logging companies didn’t end up getting their fingers too far into the park, and ten percent of the profits from selling the salvage went to buying more lands for the park.

Picture and information courtesy of  John Warren from the Adirondack Almanack (http://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2010/11/natures-wrath-the-big-blowdown-of-1950.html)