MIDLAND, Texas — As NewsWest 9 continues to cover the Smokehouse Creek fire, questions rise not only about what this could mean for the citizens, but what about the land they call home?
This fire continues to blaze leaving nothing but destruction behind.
“There's property up there, there’s houses and businesses and ranches and livestock, but the impact is very very severe," said Sibley Nature Center Scientist and Naturalist Michael Nickell.
The Earth's ecosystem evolves alongside fire, so it can usually withstand and even grow afterwards, but this is not always a beneficial trade-off.
“Fire is one of the components in nature that keeps a prairie a prairie and keeps invading shrubs from moving in and so ecologically fire is important to the ecosystem, but we’ve got a unique situation right here, we’ve got a wildfire," Nickell said.
The fire is not only devastating those up north, loss is also felt in our own backyard.
“For me personally, its heartbreaking," Nickell said. "I spent my youth growing up in the Texas Panhandle. I grew up in Amarillo, but I’m very familiar with most of the counties up in the Texas Panhandle and so it’s hard to watch that.”
Nickell was a college professor at Frank Phillips in Borger, Texas before becoming a nature scientist.
Nickell said plenty of plant debris, to fuel the flames, mixed with recent high winds have contributed to the power and momentum of the fire.
“You need the plant growth to hold your soil down," Nickell said. "And so, there’s potential damage that can be done from wind and water also until the plants grow back."
Once the fire is contained, no matter how long that takes, the immediate concern is to rebuild.
“Yes, it does a considerable amount of damage over the short term, but eventually ecosystems have the ability to repair themselves," Nickell said. "So, I think the Texas Panhandle will eventually repair itself, but in the short term, the immediate needs it's going to be very hard for the citizens to you know to get back on their feet so to speak.”
Recovery for everyone affected will be a long process, but we will work through it.