After decades of stressing how dangerous fire is in the forest, you'd think it would be ingrained into the public consciousness by now.
Which of us hasn't heard from Smokey Bear or Woodsey Owl on being careful with fire and how only we can prevent forest fires?
Who hasn't seen the damage that wildfires can do and heard the tragic stories about people who've lost their homes?
And yet in this past week we've dealt with three fires started by people, one of which took a pretty big bite out of the City of South Lake Tahoe.
We can't think of a single excuse for leaving a campfire smoldering as happened with the Angora fire. And, as that fire was finally being extinguished, people were responsible for two other fires in the area.
Perhaps it's not enough to say be careful with fire. Perhaps it's time to start licensing matches and lighters. Requiring a test before someone can operate a cigarette.
These aren't really practical solutions, but for the people who lost their homes last week, they must seem tempting.
Some of our largest fires in recent years have been the result of people doing something they shouldn't have with fire.
Angora, Waterfall, Andrew and Autumn Hills were all the result of people's failure to exercise caution with fire.
And that failure resulted in the loss of people's homes and livelihoods.
