The fire is in north-central Washington 10 miles west of Winthrop
Above: The Crescent Mountain Fire on August 15, 2018. Inciweb photo.
(Originally published at 1:50 p.m. PDT August 24, 2018)
The Crescent Mountain Fire in north-central Washington has burned over 40,000 acres since a lightning strike started it on July 29. The fire is being managed at least in some areas as a less than full suppression fire. One of the primary reasons as you can see in the 3-D map below, is that the west side is burning into sparse vegetation above 7,000 feet in steep, remote, inaccessible terrain.
A 3-D map looking northwest at the Crescent Mountain Fire, the red line, at 9 p.m. PDT August 23, 2018. The red shaded areas indicate intense heat at the time the fire was mapped by a heat-sensing aircraft. Click to enlarge.
The fire is about 10.5 miles west of both Twisp and Winthrop, Washington.
Vicinity map of the Crescent Mountain Fire in the state of Washington.
Evacuation orders are in effect for West Buttermilk Creek Road and Twisp River Road, west of the Buttermilk Creek intersection.
Northwest winds on Thursday caused the fire to be very active. The area with the greatest growth was on the south slope above the Twisp River on both sides of Scaffold Canyon and up to Scaffold Ridge. It has burned down to the West Fork of Buttermilk Creek.
Firefighters provided structural protection and assistance to homes along the Twisp River corridor throughout the day Thursday. Air operations were able to effectively slow the advance of the fire.
On the southwest side crews continue to monitor the fire within North Cascades National Park. Most of the fire is on land administered by the U.S. Forest Service.
The red line on the map was the perimeter of the Crescent Mountain Fire at 9 p.m. PDT August 23, 2018. The red shaded areas indicate intense heat at the time the fire was mapped by a heat-sensing aircraft. Click to enlarge.
If left untreated, severe rhabdo may be fatal or result in permanent disability.
Too many wildland firefighters have suffered from rhabdomyolysis (often referred to as rhabdo) in recent years. In some cases they could have been treated much earlier if the victims and those around them had recognized the symptoms.
Firefighting, both structural and wildland, involves tasks in environments that place fire fighters at increased risk for this condition. Rhabdo is a breakdown of muscle tissue that releases proteins and electrolytes into the blood stream and can cause heart and kidney damage. If left untreated, severe rhabdo may be fatal or result in permanent disability. Heat exposure and intense physical effort are just two of many known risk factors for rhabdo.
NIOSH has developed two sets of factsheets and wallet cards—one for structural firefighters and their healthcare providers and another for wildland firefighters and their healthcare providers—to increase awareness about the signs and symptoms of rhabdomyolysis and help fire fighters get early treatment to prevent more serious medical problems.
Factsheets for wildland firefighters and their healthcare providers:
Steve Bustillos tells his story of surviving the Carr Fire. Screengrab from KRCR video.
KRCR has the story of how a retired police officer in Redding, California who was trapped in the Carr Fire survived the same fire tornado that killed a Redding firefighter.
As the fire approached, Steve Bustillos was driving away from his home with his most important possessions in the back of his truck when the strong winds and debris broke a window in his vehicle allowing burning embers to blow inside the cab. He turned around to see that everything in the bed of the pickup was on fire, then the seats in the cab ignited.
He told the reporter, “The truck is moving and I’ve got both feet planted on the brake pedal and the truck is literally starting to lift itself up off the ground.”
Winds at the base of the fire tornado reached speeds in the range of 136-165 mph (EF-3 tornado strength), as indicated by wind damage to large oak trees, scouring of the ground surface, damage to roofs of houses, and lofting of large steel power line support towers, vehicles, and a steel marine shipping container within ½ mile of the entrapment site. The strong winds caused the fire to burn all live vegetation less than 1 inch in diameter and fully consume any dead biomass. Peak gas temperatures likely exceeded 2,700 °F.
The data rate for a command and control unit was reduced to 1/200th of the previous speed
Verizon’s throttling of data rates used by a fire department that subscribed to one of the company’s “unlimited” plans hampered the firefighters’ command and control at the fire.
While battling the Mendocino Complex, which has become the largest wildfire in the recorded history of California, the Santa Clara Fire Department deployed OES Incident Support Unit 5262, a command and control resource. Its primary function is to track, organize, and prioritize routing of resources from around the state and country to the sites where they are most needed. OES 5262 relies heavily on the internet to do near-real-time resource tracking.
This unit and other resources in Santa Clara County use web-based applications that rely on high-bandwidth, latency-sensitive exchanges of information with the public and to provide crucial public safety services.
While fighting the fire the County discovered the Verizon data connection for OES 5262 was being throttled. Data rates had been reduced to 1/200th, or less, than the previous speeds. Fire Chief Anthony Bowden wrote in a court filing that the “reduced speeds severely interfered with the OES 5262’s ability to function effectively”. The County has signed on to a legal effort to overturn the Federal Communication Commission’s repeal of net neutrality rules.
Below is an excerpt from an article in the San Francisco Chronicle:
Despite having paid for what it thought was an unlimited data plan, the Santa Clara County Central Fire Protection District saw its data flow “throttled” down to 1/200th of its usual speed as it fought the complex — now the biggest wildfire in state history — because Verizon officials said it had exceeded its plan limit, district Fire Chief Anthony Bowden wrote. This primarily hampered a specialized vehicle the department depends on to coordinate its machinery and staff in such emergencies, and Bowden said that put his battalions at risk.
Without full-speed service for the high-tech command and communications rig, which goes by the arcane name of OES 5262, Bowden wrote, “resources could be deployed to the wrong fire, the wrong part of a fire, or fail to be deployed at all. Even small delays in response translate into devastating effect, including loss of property, and, in some cases, loss of life.
One of the fire captains complained to Verizon that the command and control unit had been so hobbled that “it has no meaningful functionality”.
The battle with the fire morphed into a battle with Verizon as fire department personnel fought with the company about restoring their “unlimited” data rate. Eventually after getting various sections in Verizon and the Fire District involved, the cell phone plan in OES 5262 was upgraded to a more expensive plan that had more capability.
In the last couple of years all four major cell phone providers have advertised “unlimited” data plans. All of them ARE LIMITED in various ways, so it is inconceivable how the Federal Trade Commission lets them get away with false and misleading advertising.
An article published by C|NET on August 9 does a good job of comparing “unlimited” plans offered by Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, and AT&T. Of the 10 plans described, all except one have data limits, while the one that does not, limits speed used on hotspots to only 3G. Everyone is now used to 4G speeds or the even faster LTE. 5G, with much higher data rates, is just around the corner. The companies disguise how speeds will be greatly reduced after a data limit is obtained, by using words like “prioritize your data”, “deprioritized”, or just blatantly saying “customer may temporarily experience reduced speeds on these line(s) during times of network congestion”. It likely that during an emergency that affects a large number of citizens, “network congestion” will occur.
We have written many times about the “Holy Grail of Wildland Firefighting Safety”, knowing the real time location of the fire and firefighters. Depending on how these systems are configured they could rely on data delivered through the internet. If that data stream is throttled to 1/200th, is cut off, or becomes unreliable, the safety of firefighters and the public could be threatened.
The intentionally misleading use of the term “unlimited” by the four cell phone carriers is part of the problem here. The FCC and the Federal Trade Commission should do their job and stop this practice.
Graphic produced by the National Weather Service office in Missoula, Montana August 21, 2018 at 8:30 p.m. MDT.
(Originally published at 9:12 a.m. MDT August 22, 2018)
When I saw the prediction from the Missoula National Weather Service office above, it got me thinking about how this cooler, possibly wetter weather is going to affect the dozens of large wildfires currently burning in the northwest United States. Two of the fires we have written about over the last couple of days, Watson Creek in Oregon and Howe Ridge in Montana, recently had small amounts of precipitation, certainly not enough to put them out, but it will absolutely slow their spread for a day or two.
No doubt other fires were also were affected, as you can see in the map below showing precipitation over the last 48 hours. But it looks like Washington, western Oregon, and most of northern California remained dry.
Estimated precipitation for the 48-hour period ending at 8 a.m. CDT August 22, 2018.
More rain is expected in the Northern Rockies into next week. Below is the forecast for precipitation on Monday afternoon, August 27. The “haze” shown in California and Oregon is presumably smoke from the Mendocino Complex of Fires.
Predicted precipitation for August 27, 2018.
Next are the predictions for precipitation and temperature August 27 through 31.
Above: Watson Creek Fire, August 19, 2018. Photo by Barry Shullanberger
(Originally published at 2:45 p.m. PDT August 21, 2018)
During the six days the Watson Creek Fire has been spreading through the Fremont-Winema National Forest in south-central Oregon it has burned 32,104 acres 6 miles southwest of Paisley. On Tuesday it was active along most of the perimeter, but grew substantially on the west and southeast sides.
Among the locations on the fire being worked on by firefighters Tuesday were the north flank, Slide Lake, and the 3360 and 3315 Roads around Hadley Butte. Firefighters are facing challenges of hazardous trees, snags, dead and down lodgepole pine, and difficult terrain.
3-D map of the Watson Creek Fire, looking southwest, showing the perimeter (the red line) at 2:15 a.m. PDT August 21. The red shaded area represents intense heat at that time. Click to enlarge.
A thunderstorm Monday night generated a few lightning strikes east of the fire area. Rain with the storm over the fire aided firefighting efforts overnight. The temperature Tuesday will be milder with 20 to 30 percent relative humidity. Winds should be out of the north to northeast with afternoon gusts up to 15 mph with variable wind direction.
The evacuation order for the Lakeview Estates neighborhood just north of Campbell and Deadhorse Lakes in the Fremont-Winema National Forest is still in effect Tuesday.
Resources assigned to the fire include 15 hand crews, 34 fire engines, and 5 helicopters, for a total of 556 personnel.
Map of the Watson Creek Fire showing the perimeter (the red line) at 2:15 a.m. PDT August 21. The red shaded area represents intense heat at that time. Click to enlarge.
