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I was born and raised in Calgary, AB. I graduated high school and, for lack of anything else to do, I attended the University of Calgary. I eventually graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce and naturally began working in the corporate world of Alberta’s oil and gas industry. On weekends and evenings, I managed to escape the glass and concrete of the city and ventured out to the mountains on foot, on bike, and on ski. The great wages, company paid lunches, dinners, bar tabs, hockey games, concerts and stampeding all eventually became too much, so after about ten years I decided I needed a new career that offered much lower salaries and fewer benefits.
With a decent severance in my back pocket, I left cowtown and went to Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, BC to study Natural Resource Sciences hoping it would lead to a career where I could work outside rather than just look at it from the top floor windows of an office tower. I was very fortunate to get my first field job with Tembec Industries in Cranbrook, BC as a Silviculture Technician and ended up staying with them for three seasons. While there, I received an NSERC Undergraduate Research grant to study wildfire burn patterns in riparian areas. My interest in fire was piqued but still I was not entirely sure of what I wanted to do when I grew up. I then worked one summer for the Foothills Model Forest setting up Grizzly Bear hair-traps in the Bragg Creek and Kananaskis areas west of Calgary. Despite hiking and biking in the woods with bovine blood in my pack and dragging a sack of rotting fish around, I survived that summer with no bear sightings. I happily returned to Kamloops for my final semester of studies and graduated TRU in December 2006 with my second Bachelor degree. I quickly moved to Edson, AB to be with my significant other and began looking for full-time work. In the early part of 2007, I was offered a short contract with Alberta Sustainable Resource Development Fish and Wildlife Division assisting the Species at Risk Biologist which gave me valuable writing and literature research experience. I finally found my way back to fire and began work with the Wildland Fire Operations Research Group at FPInnovations – Feric Division at the end of April 2007.
Email: Colleen Mooney
Fuelbreak Effectiveness in Canada’s Boreal Forests: A synthesis of current knowledge - Final Report 5/25/2010
Martin Mars Aerial Delivery Trials 5/13/2010
Fuelbreak effectiveness: state of the knowledge - Literature Summary (PDF) 3/11/2009
Fuelbreak effectiveness: state of the knowledge - Literature Summary 3/11/2009
Fuelbreak effectiveness in the boreal forest: state of the knowledge project page 3/9/2009
Fire Behaviour in Simulated Mountain Pine Beetle Attacked Pine Stand Project Page 3/27/2008
Researcher - Colleen Mooney 3/6/2008