Strong winds are causing the Eastland Complex of fires to spread rapidly
Map of Eastland Complex of fires in Texas at 6 a.m. March 18, 2022.
Dry, windy weather has created conditions in West Texas that has allowed multiple wildfires to spread across tens of thousands of acres. Several of the largest blazes are in Eastland County 45 miles east-southeast of Abilene. The passage of a cold front Thursday afternoon caused the fires to spread to the southeast as 15 to 25 mph winds recorded at a weather station near Eastland began gusting out of the northwest at 28 to 35 mph while the relative humidity dropped as low as 7 percent.
For management purposes the Texas Forest Service has grouped four of the incidents into what they are calling the Eastland Complex which has burned approximately 45,000 acres.
Eastland Complex of fires, near Carbon, Texas March 17, 2022. Texas Forest Service photo by M. Leathers.
The 36,000-acre Kidd Fire south of Eastland burned through Carbon March 17, heavily impacting structures. Evacuations and road closures are in effect in Carbon, Lake Leon, Gorman, and outlying rural areas.
The Wheatfield Fire northeast of Cross Plains has burned about 5,000 acres. Thursday it started moving in the direction of Rising Star after the passage of the cold front, but crews were able to stop its forward progression.
The Oak Mott Fire has blackened approximately 5,000 acres southwest of Rising Star.
The Walling Fire northeast of Cross Plains was mapped at 382 acres and is nearly officially contained.
A fire not in the Complex is the 586-acre Mariah Ridge Fire south of Cross Plains.
The weather forecast indicates conditions suitable for continued fire spread. On Friday the northwest winds will continue at 21 mph gusting in the 30s, but slowing to 8 mph by sundown and dropping to 2 to 5 mph Friday night. The Friday afternoon relative humidity will be in the low 20s with a high temperature of 63. On Saturday firefighters can expect a wind shift out of the southwest and south at 9 to 11 mph gusting around 20 with 75 degrees and 16 percent RH.
Multiple highway closures are in effect due to extreme fire behavior. See DriveTexas.org for the latest in closure information.
The drought is expected to continue in the brown areas. (NOAA. Updated March 17, 2022)
In an analysis updated March 17 by NOAA, the drought in the western half of the United States is expected continue at least through June 30, 2022, affecting parts of 23 states.
And in most of those areas the temperatures will be higher than average and there will be less than average precipitation.
Three-month precipitation and temperature outlook, updated March 17, 2022. NOAA.
In addition to meeting on Wednesday with the Secretary of Labor and other Administration officials, today, Thursday, the group of wildland firefighters and National Federation of Federal Employees personnel who traveled to Washington, DC met with two officials at the White House.
They talked with Erika Dinkel-Smith, a former BLM firefighter who worked in Nevada, California, and Oregon while she was going to college. She now works as the White House Director of Labor Engagement. The group also met with Cedric Richmond, who gave up his congressional seat to be a Senior Advisor to the President and the Director of The White House Office of Public Engagement.
“We didn’t have long with Director Richmond, but we did discuss topics many wildland firefighters face, such as low pay, homelessness, and high rates of suicide. We also discussed Tim’s Act”, said smokejumper Ben Elkind. “Cedric had some animated responses when he learned about these issues we face and I’m confident we have many allies in the White House that will push for real reforms within the USFS and DOI. Neither of these people had to meet with us and they were truly interested in our experiences. Really great people who are friendly and approachable, if you can get through security.”
As a former @BLMFire wildland firefighter, I was honored to meet with @NFFE Wildland firefighters alongside @Richmond46 at the @WhiteHouse today. We are incredibly grateful for the dangerous work you do on the fireline. Stay safe out there. pic.twitter.com/UWHfeYtk0r
Left to right in the photo above: Justin Mahaffey (USFS Engine Captain), Ethan West – (NFFE), Bob Beckley (NFFE), Max Alonzo – (NFFE), Cedric Richmond (Senior Advisor to the President and the Director of The White House Office of Public Engagement), Randy Erwin (NFFE – President), Ben Elkind (USFS – Smokejumper), Erika Dinkel-Smith (White House Director of Labor Engagement), Hannah Coolidge (USFS Hotshot).
Originally published at 1:27 p.m. ET March 17, 2022
NFFE meets with Secretary of Labor, March 16, 2022. L to R: Max Alonzo (NFFE), Bob Beckley (NFFE), Hannah Coolidge (USFS Hotshot), Marty Walsh (Sec. Of Labor), Dane Ostler (USFS – Prevention), Ben Elkind (USFS – Smokejumper), Randy Erwin (NFFE – President), and Jeff Friday (NFFE).
Yesterday a group of wildland firefighters and officials from the National Federation of Federal Employees met with the Secretary of Labor and other administration officials in Washington, DC. The NFFE is a union that represents some of the employees in the federal agencies that have land management responsibilities.
Ben Elkind, a smokejumper, told Wildfire Today that they talked with officials and legislative staff members mostly about passing a bill named after Tim Hart, a smokejumper who was killed on a fire in New Mexico last year. The Tim Hart Wildland Firefighter Classification and Pay Parity Act (H.R. 5631), would address many of the heartbreaking issues wildland firefighters and their partners face, including raising firefighter pay, creating a wildland firefighter job series, providing health care and mental health services to temporary and permanent wildland firefighters, as well as housing stipends and other improvements. (More details are in the Wildfire Today article from October 19, 2021.)
The Office of Worker’s Compensation Programs (OWCP) is within the Department of Labor, and has been heavily criticised for slow-walking or failing to appropriately process the claims of firefighters injured on the job. It has not been uncommon for firefighters for the U.S. Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management to resort to asking the public to give them money at GoFundMe because their employer refused to honor the requirement to pay their doctor, hospital, and physical rehabilitation expenses.
“We met with Marty Walsh yesterday, the Secretary of Labor,” Mr. Elkind wrote in an email. “He’s the former mayor of Boston and very pro-labor. We shared some stories about our pay and work/life balance and he was astounded. He promised to bring this up with the President and try to work on legislation, but also acknowledged that the bureaucracy is very real and difficult to maneuver. Marty was very down to earth, and I believe he has our backs moving forward. Hopefully we can get something done this year, but it will be a lot of work.”
The Office of Worker’s Compensation Programs responded to a letter from six Senators
An injured firefighter is moved using a “conveyor belt” technique on the Deer Park Fire in central Idaho, August 6, 2010. Screen grab from USFS video.
In responding to a letter from six U.S. Senators, the Director of the Office of Worker’s Compensation Programs (OWCP) has promised better processing of claims from firefighters injured on the job.
The incompetence of the OWCP in quickly and fairly paying the medical bills for wildland firefighters has become a quagmire that should infuriate citizens of the United States. Men and women serving their country who suffered serious, life-changing injuries, in some cases were hounded by bill collectors, forced to attempt to pay huge fees for their treatment, and had to declare bankruptcy resulting in their credit rating dropping into the toilet. It has not been uncommon for firefighters for the U.S. Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management to resort to asking the public to give them money at GoFundMe, because their employer refused to honor their requirement to pay their doctor, hospital, and physical rehabilitation expenses.
The first sentence of the Senators’ February 14, 2022 letter to OWCP Director Christopher Godfrey said: “We urge you to expedite the establishment of a special claims unit to handle firefighter compensation claims so that it can be in place before the start of the 2022 fire season.”
The Special Claims Unit processes death benefits for members of the Armed Forces who die in connection with a “contingency operation.” The OWCP told Buzzfeed News in December, 2021 that they were in the process of developing new procedures and modifying existing policies to include the use of the Special Claims Unit. But apparently by February 14 it may have appeared to the Senators not to have been done, which prompted the letter.
A response from the OWCP was dated March 9, coincidentally the day after Wildfire Today wrote about the effects of the agency dragging its feet in paying the medical bills for Casey Allen, a US Forest Service firefighter seriously burned while serving on the Dolan Fire, September 8, 2020. He finally got some financial relief after U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal and his district representative Wendy Motta were able to break a stubborn repayment logjam so Allen and his wife Tina could be reimbursed for money they had to pay toward his recovery.
In the March 9 letter from Director Godfrey, he wrote that as of December 15, 2021 they had adjusted procedures so that the Special Claims Unit now adjudicates all new incoming firefighter claims, and that it “should improve customer service and consistency in navigating through the medical requirements of their claims.”
In addition, Director Godfrey wrote, they are developing policy regarding the evidentiary requirements needed to link a firefighter’s exposure to toxic substances which can lead to “cancers, heart disease, and lung disease that firefighters are at risk for. Our policy will also recognize the difference between structural and wildland firefighters and their unique exposure risks.” They plan to train the Special Claims Unit to understand the new policies.
“Completion of these new procedures is expected by Spring of 2022,” said Director Godfrey. (We checked the official dates for Spring, and this year it is March 20 through June 21.)
This new structure could be a step toward recognizing presumptive diseases, a policy that is in effect in many agencies that employ firefighters. A bill that has been introduced in both the House and the Senate provides that heart disease, lung disease, and specified cancers of federal employees employed in fire protection activities for at least 5 years are presumed to be proximately caused by such employment if the employee is diagnosed with the disease within 10 years of employment; and the disability or death of the employee due to such disease is presumed to result from personal injury sustained in the performance of duty.
Below are photos of the March 9 letter from the Director.
Two firefighters and two local residents were injured at a grass fire Tuesday afternoon southwest of Sinton, Texas. The firefighters were taken by helicopter to hospitals in Corpus Christi and San Antonio.
The blaze burned 385 acres off FM 1945 west of Love’s Truck Stop.
Sinton FD engine. Photo courtesy of Oscar Rivera, San Patricio County Sheriff. March 15, 2022.
San Patricio County Sheriff Oscar Rivera said, “The crew was trapped in the blaze and their fire truck burned to the ground.”
Sinton FD engine. Photo courtesy of Oscar Rivera, San Patricio County Sheriff. March 15, 2022.Sinton, Texas fire. Photo courtesy of Oscar Rivera, San Patricio County Sheriff. March 15, 2022.
At 3 p.m. on Tuesday a weather station near Mathis recorded 85 degrees, 37 percent relative humidity, and 9 mph winds gusting out of the south at 24 mph.
Fire Marshall Steven Loving said another fire in the area was started by a lawnmower as a resident was mowing his yard.
All but one member of the Granite Mountain Hotshots were killed on the Yarnell Hill Fire in 2013
Yarnell Hill fire at 7:30 p.m. MST, June 29, 2013, approximately 21 hours before the 19 fatalities. Photo by ATGS Rory Collins.
Researchers at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University have published the results of their work which show that winds out of a thunderstorm affected the Yarnell Hill Fire. On June 30, 2013 at about 4:45 p.m. local time 19 members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots were killed as the fire changed direction and overran their position.
The weather that led to the fatalities has been clear since we covered it on Wildfire Today about three hours after the burnover before the entrapment was officially confirmed:
…This was apparently caused by a 180-degree shift in the direction of the wind. From 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. local time at the Stanton RAWS weather station four miles south of the fire, the wind was from the south-southwest or southwest, but at 5 p.m. it began blowing from the north-northeast at 22 to 26 mph gusting up to 43 mph. This may have pushed the fire into the town.
If there were any firefighters on the south or southwest side of the fire between 4 and 5 p.m., who previously had the wind at their backs for seven hours with the fire moving away from them, they may have suddenly and unexpectedly found the fire heading toward them at a rapid rate. Wind direction changes like this are sometimes caused by a passing thunderstorm with strong outflowing downdrafts.
And a few minutes later:
Radar at 4 p.m. MST, June 30, 2013 The pointer is at Yarnell, Arizona. WeatherUnderground.
The radar map above from WeatherUnderground shows a thunderstorm cell north and northeast of the fire at Yarnell, Arizona. The pointer is at Yarnell. The cell was moving toward the southwest, and may have produced strong winds that changed the wind direction by 180 degrees and could have been part of the reason the fire moved into Yarnell. It also could have caught firefighters by surprise.
In 2014 an animation of the weather event was developed by Janice Coen, Ph.D., a Project Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. It simulates through a coupled weather-wildland fire environment model the spread of the Yarnell Hill Fire and the wind direction and speed. The arrows indicate the wind direction; the length of the arrows varies with the wind speed.
Below is a summary written by Ginger Pinholster, of the recent research conducted at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University about the event.
Nineteen firefighters who lost their lives in Arizona’s 2013 Yarnell Hill fire were likely victims of the same meteorological event that caused a deadly 1985 airplane crash, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University researchers have reported.
City of Prescott firefighters who were members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots were probably surprised by a sudden microburst during the Yarnell Hill fire, according to Embry-Riddle meteorologists Curtis N. James and Michael Kaplan.
A microburst, and the wind shear induced by it, was also what sent a commercial airliner careening off the runway at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, killing 137 people on Aug. 2, 1985. That accident prompted major improvements in aviation safety. The National Transportation Safety Board concluded that there had been no way for the L-1011 aircraft to detect microbursts and wind changes. In response, NASA researchers developed new warning technology, and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration required all commercial aircraft to have on-board wind shear detection systems.
Firefighters do not yet have equivalent protections.
Although microbursts can be detected by Doppler weather radar scanning right above the ground, radar signals are blocked over mountainous terrain or in remote areas where wildfires occur. With funding from the National Science Foundation, James and Kaplan have been collaborating with researchers and graduate students at North Carolina A&T University as well as the National Weather Service to better understand and learn from the tragedy of the Yarnell Hill fire.
On June 30, 2013, “Firefighters knew about the squall line over the Bradshaw Mountains and its outflow moving toward Yarnell,” said James, professor of Meteorology on Embry-Riddle’s Prescott Campus. “What they weren’t anticipating was that a storm cell would develop and create a microburst just to the east of Yarnell. We think the outflow from that microburst rushed westward toward the fire, which then redirected the fire’s motion.”
Microbursts can form very quickly around the periphery of larger, previously identified storms, explained Kaplan, an Embry-Riddle adjunct faculty member and professor emeritus with the Desert Research Institute. “When they hit the ground, microbursts barrel outward, often at high speeds,” added Kaplan, who worked on a team that studied the 1985 crash of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 in Texas.
The Yarnell Hill fire, ignited by lightning amid a drought and extreme summer temperatures, turned in response to the microburst outflow. The fire then rapidly and unexpectedly advanced on the firefighters as they were trying to make their way to safety through a ravine, James said. Analysis of historical meteorological data showed that wind on the north side of the fire, at the Emergency Operations Center, was moving from the north-northeast at 13 miles per hour (mph), whereas in Stanton, southeast of the fire, the wind was gusting to 47 mph.
“It was a very different situation on the south side versus the north side of the fire,” James noted. “Fine-scale convective storm cells can create that type of variability in the wind. That’s something the firefighters weren’t anticipating.”
Staying Safe on the Front Lines
First responders should have access to more information about microbursts, the Embry-Riddle researchers said. Even as an initial thunderstorm may seem to be waning, “It may spawn new storm cells that are extremely focused and intense, and incredibly small sometimes, yet they can wreak havoc,” Kaplan said.
To help raise awareness of the risks of microbursts, James and Kaplan recently shared their findings at the Annual Meeting of the American Meteorological Society. The work has also been published by the journal Climate and the journal Atmosphere.
The next step for the research, Kaplan said, is to run higher-resolution model simulations coupled with a fire behavior model. If all goes well, this “forensic meteorology” approach will show the motion of the fire as it moved through the complex terrain toward the firefighters at Yarnell Hill. At a resolution of 50 meters, “That would get us pretty close to the scale of what the firefighters actually saw that day,” Kaplan said. “That’s our goal.”
In addition to James and Kaplan, the research team includes Mark R. Sinclair, of Embry-Riddle; North Carolina A&T State University researcher Yuh-Lang Lin and his graduate students; and Andrew A. Taylor of the National Weather Service. The research involved the use of the Cheyenne supercomputer at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and is funded by the National Science Foundation.
