Will the Trailhead Registry burn in a forest fire?

Question

I posted an answer for a recent question about a forest fire that started after your hike began, that said:

Presumably you registered at the trailhead, and you have a friend who knows where you are. There should be aircraft in the area soon attempting to identify your location and risk level. Source

A comment was posted in response

The trailhead registry will probably burn in a forest fire. source

In my experience the trailhead registry is usually elevated on posts in a mostly cleared area. The paper register form is inside a closed boxed, that should protect it from the rain and any fire.

I assume that in the event of a new forest fire, the forest rangers would check all the trailhead registries in the area to assess for hikers at risk.

Googling images found mostly what I expected. I searched and did not find any thing one way or the other about what the likelihood of the registry burning before the rangers had a chance to retrieve it.

NOTE: In many cases hiker must register at the ranger station, or through some other means (electronic). This question is only about paper registry at the trailhead location.

Answer 1

They probably will burn, see this one for example,

_{(source: 14ers.com)}

Image Source

Also wood has a higher ignition temperature.

Sometimes they are in metal boxes on metal posts, but quite often they are wood or metal boxes on top of wood posts.

Also,

• They don't always have paper.

• The paper doesn't always have space for new entries.

• People forget to sign them.

• People forget to mark that they are out of the woods.

• People enter at one trailhead and leave by another.

So all in all, they are not a perfect source of information on who is in the woods.