Wildfire Today

Fairfax, Va., June 30, 2008… The International Association of Fire Chiefs Digital Project Working Group today released its Interim Report and Recommendations: Fireground Noise and Digital Radio Transmissions. This report culminates a year’s work with public-safety organizations, manufacturers and the laboratory services of the federal government to determine the extent of radio transmission problems associated with fireground noise.

To review the report, go to DPWG Interim Report on the IAFC website. Two important companion reports also are posted on the site: the IAFC Portable Radio Best Practices presentation; and the National Telecommunications & Information Administration report, Intelligibility of Selected Radio Systems in the Presence of Fireground Noise: Test Plan and Results.

The intent of the IAFC interim report is to alert the fire service that noise on the fireground can interfere with intelligible radio communications. The report is organized into sections that provide background on the issue, the steps the Digital Project Working Group took to investigate the problem in an objective laboratory setting, the results of the testing and corresponding analysis and recommendations, and best operational practices.

HERE is a link to a pretty good map that shows most of the major fires in California, updated July 1 at 1900.

On June 28 we posted a map that showed smoke plumes from California reaching east all the way to Missouri. Today there is even more smoke across the U.S. but most of it is not from the California fires. It originates in Canada, California, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Mississippi.

On the map below, the red dots are fires and the gray areas are smoke.

The Basin Complex near Big Sur continues to spread on the north, east and south sides. Firefighters are requiring a mandatory evacuation on the west side of the fire for both sides of Highway 1 from Partington Ridge Road to 1 mile south of Limekiln State Park effective at 5:00 p.m. Tuesday, July 1, to provide for the safety of residents and firefighters while crews conduct a burning operation that will reinforce containment lines on the south end of the fire.

One place they are conducting firing operations is on the south side along the North Coast Ridge Trail. They are burning along a fireline that will connect the Basin complex to the Indians fire along that trail and the Rodeo Flats trail.

Here is the latest map, showing heat detected by satellites (in black, orange, and red), and the perimeter (in yellow) uploaded by the incident management team. Click on it to see a larger version.

The firing operation on the Indians fire is complete, and official containment is predicted for July 3.