[1][3] The starting point was high on Cerro Grande, a 10,200-foot (3110-m) summit on the rim of the Valles Caldera not far north of New Mexico State Road 4, the main highway through Los Alamos County.

Ms Gary Jones, associate director of energy, resources, and science issues at the general accounting office, points out a lack of consideration toward fuel buildup in the park, nearby Santa Fe National Forest, and the thousands of people living in Los Alamos and surrounding communities.

However, not doing the burn might also have been disastrous because the entire southern slope of Cerro Grande was tinder-dry and ready to ignite catastrophically in the event of a lightning strike (hardly unusual in the Jemez in the spring) or human carelessness with fire.

This tendency was exacerbated in Cerro Grande's aftermath because the soil in the burned areas had become hydrophobic, raising the specter of drastically increased water flow in the streams in the canyons that the existing streambeds might not have been able to handle.

This concern, coupled with the prospect of monsoon rains that typically begin in about July in the area, made dealing with the possibility of flooding urgent.

[8] Although flash floods were fortuitously minimal, erosion nonetheless was substantial, and many miles of the 57-mile network of trails maintained by Los Alamos County were severely damaged.

During July 2000, about 7000 hydromulching and hydroseeding flights by air tractors were carried out on 1,600 acres (6.5 km2) of the burned area to reduce erosion and speed revegetation.

The presence of Los Alamos National Laboratory in and downstream of the burned area posed several unusual problems in remediation, beyond the ones resulting directly from destruction of some of the institution's buildings by fire.

Other problems arose from fire-generated soot that seeped into buildings, shorting out electrical equipment and clogging HEPA filters necessary to the operation of clean rooms at some of the laboratories.

[9] A compound of portable buildings ("trailers"), known locally as FEMAville, was constructed on undeveloped land near the county rodeo grounds on North Mesa, providing housing for hundreds of displaced residents.

On June 20, 2000, residents of Isleta and Sandia Pueblos hired four environmental engineers to permanently work with the Cerro Grande Wild Fire aftermath.

A 40-member forestry crew with members from the Eight Northern Pueblos has built 3,000 small dams (to minimize siltation of Santa Clara Creek), and planted one million trees on 3,500 acres (14 km2).

[3] In August 2000, a review of the events leading up to the prescribed fire and how it was managed resulted in lessons learned and recommendations for fuel reduction from the US General Accounting Office.

This initiative remains controversial, and its applicability to the relatively sparse forests of the Jemez Mountains that were consumed in the Cerro Grande Fire is unclear.

[5] The goal is to reduce the build up of dead wood and brush on the ground, called fuels, to minimize the risk of destructive wildfires spreading to surrounding communities.

[11] The local community has also taken many steps to prevent and protect against future wildfires, including removing vegetation around buildings to increase defensible space, replacing roof and sheathing materials (e.g. cedar shakes) with less flammable materials, and continued thinning and reduction of fuels in unburned wooded areas in and around town, particularly in the canyons below populated mesas.