One of the first things I learned as a wildland firefighter was how to accurately and effectively use a firefighting shovel to throw dirt as a means to cool or slow down a flare up on a wildfire. I could even hit a burning area on a tree 20 or 25 feet above the ground. Today, many shovels on hand crews have been replaced by Combi Tools which are useful for a “combination” of tasks, but have a smaller spoon area and are less efficient for throwing dirt.
Dirt throwing machine by EXiTT
But the prize-winner for dirt throwing has to go to a piece of equipment developed by a company in Spain, EXiTT. The name is based on “extinción incendios tierra-tierra”, Spanish for ground to ground fire extinguisher. The company has three prototypes for machines that excavate dirt and throw huge quantities of it at a vegetation fire. Covering a fire with dirt will rarely extinguish it, but it can slow it to a smoldering state, making it much easier to control. You may have to later expose the burning material in order to completely extinguish the fire.
Dirt throwing machine by EXiTT
It is not exactly a MIST or “minimum impact suppression technique“, but looks like it may be useful in some situations where environmental disturbance is not an issue. It reminds us of a machine we wrote about a few months ago that digs dirt, vacuums it up, and then blasts it at a wildfire.
A team of cause and origin fire investigators led by New Mexico State Forestry has determined that a powerline caused the Las Conchas fire northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico. The fire has become the largest fire in New Mexico history and has blackened over 121,000 acres while running up suppression costs of $5.4 million and burning 63 residences. Here is an excerpt of a news release at New Mexico Fire Information:
An interagency investigative team led by New Mexico State Forestry has been determined that the Las Conchas Fire was caused by a fallen tree that caught fire after coming into contact with nearby power lines, according to New Mexico State Forester Tony Delfin.
Investigators from New Mexico State Forestry, the USDA Forest Service, New Mexico State Police and Sandoval County conducted the investigation and were on scene shortly after the fire started on Sunday, June 26. Since then, the fire has burned more than 121,248 acres.
Investigators believe the fire started after an aspen tree was blown down onto nearby power lines during a period of strong winds. The contact resulted in the line arcing, which then caused the tree to catch fire. Heat and flame caused the line to snap, which then allowed the burning tree to fall onto the ground where the fire spread into nearby vegetation.
We found a video of a fire starting when a tree contacted a powerline in Bellingham, Washington. Below is a screen capture, and HERE is a link to the video.
As of 8:00 a.m. on Sunday, July 3, the evacuation order for the Los Alamos town site has been lifted, except, State Route 4 remains closed west of Monterey Drive South and all access points to the Jemez Mountains remain closed.
Firefighters made good progress yesterday. Overcast skies and higher relative humidity played a vital role in moderating fire behavior. Some rain was received on portions of the fire. There was no major movement of the fire today, and firefighters were able to get handline around the northeast corner of the fire. A lightning strike started a small fire east of White Rock which was quickly contained by numerous fire resources.
The fire has burned 121,248 acres and is reportedly 11% contained.
Maps
It has now been a week since the Las Conchas fire in northern New Mexico started on June 26 and today, Sunday July 3, the incident management team has posted current maps of the fire, produced from data collected on an infrared mapping flight that occurred yesterday at 10:54 p.m. This is a major improvement by the IMTeam in providing one of the important facts about the largest fire in Arizona history — where it is. Before this weekend, if there was a map on the IMTeam’s InciWeb site at all, it contained data 36-48 hours old by the time it was posted. The earliest map on the IMTeam’s InciWeb site is dated June 30.
Photos
The IMTeam has not posted any photos of the fire. We just discovered that “Las Conchas Fire Information” has posted photos, not on InciWeb, but on Flickr. Los Alamos National Laboratory posted some images on Flickr until they stopped on July 1. A Wildfire Today reader sent us some great photos he took shortly after the fire started.
Los Alamos National Laboratory, in cooperation with a private company, has posted some interesting aerial images of the fire and the surrounding areas using new technology developed for the military.
Today we have a guest post written by Dan O’Brien, who has over 39 years of experience in wildland fire management. Dan was Chief of Fire and Aviation for three different regions in the National Park Service: the North Atlantic, Rocky Mountain, and Intermountain regions. Currently he is on the staff of Wildland Fire Associates.
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Dan O’Brien
I have always thought fire information folks have one of the most difficult jobs in fire. They must get the information their different audiences are looking for and distribut it in a timely manner. Operations folks are charged with managing the “actual fire”, but the information staff must manage the “perceived fire” through the information they distribute. While different information outlets are aimed at different audiences it seems that there are often significant gaps, inconsistencies and timeliness issues in the information released.
With regard to information concerning the Las Conchas Fire today (7/1/11) NICC’s daily Situation Report references such current information as:
Active fire behavior. Numerous residences threatened. Evacuations in effect.
It would seem that “numerous residences threatened” might be a bit of an understatement considering there are 11,000 residents in Los Alamos, but it is not mine to split hairs.
Today’s InciWeb page concerning the Las Conchas Fire seems to target the locals and their concerns. Meeting places and times, shelters, closures, pet issues, number and type of resources, etc. are important issues that are adequately addressed. Additionally, there are descriptions of yesterday’s fire behavior, operational objectives and strategies. All this information is accurate, but what is the significance of making all this information available without interpreting it to the public? Reporting 4 dozers, 67 engines, 24 water tenders is pretty useless information in and of itself. Explaining that the engines and water tenders are being used to directly protect residences and other values would go much farther in helping the public understand the need for these and other resources and could go a long way in helping to correctly develop the public’s perception of the fire. I have never heard any information about the effect, positive or negative, of the 2000 Cerro Grande fire on the management of the Las Conchas Fire. Considering 400 families lost their home to the Cerro Grande Fire 11 years ago, I would think there would be an interpretive opportunity in there someplace.
This morning I see on a national news network that the residents of Los Alamos are going to be allowed to return to their homes on Sunday. Other information is reported such as the success or failure of firefighters in keeping a fire from crossing a road or drainage is the sort of information a large segment of the public wants to know and be kept current on. InciWeb is silent concerning these subjects and seems content to report only what has already happened.
Bottom line is that the fire information folks do an excellent job of gathering a lot of information, but then often refrain from doing even basic interpretation that could make the information meaningful to their publics. Just one man’s opinion………
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Note from Bill:
Last year we wrote about an outside-the-box method for providing fire information to the public. In that case an Information Officer Trainee, Leah Mitchell, wrote an article after she was embedded with a Wildland Fire Module while she was assigned to the Cow Creek fire in Rocky Mountain National Park. At the time, we said it was one of the best articles we had ever seen about what firefighters actually do out on the fireline — and we still think so. This is an excellent method for providing one aspect of information about a fire to the public. We hope Information Officers continue to keep this tool in their tool box, although this is the only time we have heard of an agency employee embedding with a fire crew in order to collect information for an article.
Fire-qualified and red-carded agency employees have access to remote firelines and background wildfire knowledge that reporters will never have. Allowing them to actually write articles about ongoing fires, rather than only expecting InciWeb or the dwindling number of newspaper reporters to get the agencies’ messages out to the public, is a smart strategy.
The Las Conchas fire, taken at 1:44 p.m. June 26, 2011. Photo: Michael Grady
On July 2 we posted a photo of the Las Conchas fire in New Mexico that Michael Grady took soon after the fire started. Michael was hiking in the Valles Caldera National Preserve (VCNP) northwest of Santa Fe when a nearby smoke column pierced the sky and was kind enough to send us copies of his photos. Here are some of the others that he took, all within the first three hours after the fire started. According to InciWeb, the fire started at “approximately 1:00 p.m.”
The Las Conchas fire as seen from the VCNP visitor center at 3:38 p.m., June 26, 2011. Photo: Michael Grady
The Las Conchas fire as seen from New Mexico Highway 4, looking west at 3:46 p.m., June 26, 2011. Photo: Michael Grady
Click to enlarge. Las Conchas fire, Rabbit Mountain & private land. Taken from the north rim of the Valles Caldera National Preserve at 3:38 p.m., June 26, 2011. Photo by Michael Grady
Michael Grady was hiking in the Valles Caldera National Preserve northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico when the Las Conchas fire started nearby. He took some pictures, and was kind enough to send them to Wildfire Today.
When he saw how close the fire was, he started hiking out, and he and some other hikers were picked up by a Preserve shuttle van which took them to safety.
We have been very busy recently, and when time permits, will post more of Michael’s photos.
