One of the most critical wildfire research facilities in the Pacific Northwest — the U.S. Forest Service's Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Lab in Seattle — has been identified for potential closure as part of the Trump administration's sweeping Forest Service reorganization, raising urgent concerns about the loss of irreplaceable fire science and smoke forecasting capabilities at the start of what could be an historic fire season.
What the Lab Does
The Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Lab, based on the University of Washington campus in Seattle, is one of the leading applied fire research facilities in the country. Among its most visible products is a real-time smoke and fire tracking system co-developed with UW fire ecologists — now accessible at fire.airnow.gov — that is used by federal and state emergency managers, incident management teams, and millions of members of the public who rely on commercial weather apps during fire season.
Ernesto Alvarado, a fire ecologist and associate professor at UW's School of Environmental and Forest Sciences, described the technology's importance: "If someone is living in Ruidoso, New Mexico, they can go and see where the smoke is going to." He emphasized that the lab's work is the product of "decades by one team" of institutional knowledge that cannot be quickly replicated.
56 of 90 Research Stations on Closure List
The proposed Forest Service reorganization — which also includes relocating agency headquarters from Washington, D.C. to Utah and consolidating regional offices — would close 56 of 90 USFS research stations nationwide. The closure of the Seattle lab would eliminate or displace a team of researchers, graduate students, and IT staff who maintain and update the fire and smoke tracking systems relied on by first responders.
Morgan Varner, a former fire behavior scientist at the Seattle lab, expressed alarm at the pace of reorganization. "There's a haphazard to it that I think is troubling from a scientist standpoint," Varner said.
Budget Cuts Compound the Problem
Beyond the reorganization, President Trump's proposed Forest Service budget, if approved by Congress, would dramatically reduce the agency's capacity for both research and on-the-ground fire prevention work. The Forest Service already lost thousands of staff in 2025 through layoffs, voluntary buyouts, and early retirements driven by DOGE-related budget pressure. Analysis by Hawk Eye Strategies LLC found that more than 26,000 positions have been eliminated across federal land management agencies overall, with roughly 35% of those losses in Western states.
Hugh Safford, formerly with the USFS and now at UC-Davis, was direct about the implications: "I think the major problem in fire management is the sudden and what I think is shocking disavowal of everything we've learned over the last 60 years."
Timing Could Not Be Worse
Fire scientists are particularly alarmed by the timing. The NIFC's June–September 2026 outlook forecasts above-normal wildfire potential across most of the West — including the Pacific Northwest — through the summer. Year-to-date, 32,373 fires have burned more than 2.5 million acres nationally, well above the 10-year average of 1.43 million acres for the same period.
The University of Washington campus atmosphere has become "tense," according to NPR reporting, as funding from the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health has also been suspended or cut, affecting university departments that partner with the Forest Service on fire-related research. Alvarado said the need for new fire science technology has never been greater: "We need to bring new technology fast."
No final decisions on individual lab closures have been announced, but fire managers and researchers are calling on Congress to protect fire research funding before the consequences materialize on the fireline this summer.