irefighters learned some important things from the massive wallow and las conchas fires. and tonight they shared some of those lessons with east mountain residents. joe vigil was the only t-v reporter at that meeting and is in the newsroom with more. even though the fires weren't in the backyard of east mountain residents--about 50 people showed up to hear what firefighters learned that could impact them some day. if a big fire broke out in the sandias susan and scott johnson would want one thing right away. "just wanting to have immediate information." the johnson's attended this meeting at san antonito elementary to hear lessons learned from the wallow and las conchas fire. fire officials say phones and computers crashed during the wallow fire because of power outages ---and the amount of emails being sent to inform residents about the fire. they brought in a social media expert on the las conchas fire and worked out some technology minute thumbnail 10:09 pm glitches. "as far as lessons learned that's important for them to understand how to be able to move forward." when fire fighters saw the intensity of the 500-thousand acre wallow fire in arizona--that drifted into new mexico-- they say they didn't take any chances when the las conchas fire flared up. "we divided it up into zones quicker. we brought in more incident management teams and more resources." firefighters told east mountain residents tonight areas the size of football fields were burning in just 2 and half seconds in the las conchas fire. they took away a couple things people in fire zones can learn om as well. they say successful evacuations helped crews attack both fires while some homes did burn in both fires crews say forest thinning helped save others. "i think the biggest difference in homes being saved on both of the fires was the kinds of fuel minute thumbnail 10:10 pm mitigation that had been in place done around the community." firefighters say they tried to get more technology to inform residents when wildfires break out--but say it's been very difficult to even get money to pay for satellite phones.
