Lightning that occurred during the 30-hour period that ended at 6 a.m. MDT July 23, 2018. The lighter colors are the most recent. The map shows all strikes. Approximately 20% are usually cloud to ground. Click to enlarge.
In spite of the weather forecast, the lightning predicted for Southwest Oregon on Sunday didn’t really pan out, but portions of other western states received thousands of strikes. Firefighters may have some followup to do in Northeast Montana, Southwest Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, the Sierras in California, and states in the Great Plains.
During the rest of this week Southern California will likely experience temperatures much higher than normal, possibly setting a few daily records. Weak hot and dry sundowner winds could occur near Santa Barbara bringing compressional heating and high fire danger.
Here’s more weather information from the National Interagency Fire Center, issued July 23:
A critical fire weather scenario will begin to set up as shards of monsoonal moisture begin to filter further into the Pacific Northwest and the Northern Rockies. These storms, while still isolated, will be dry and should trigger new starts as the stage begins to set for the next few days after [Monday], which should be pretty convective.
Map showing the 2013 Rim Fire and the 2018 Ferguson Fire as of July 21, 2018. Click to enlarge.
At its peak the 2013 Rim Fire east of Sonora, California, had over 5,000 personnel assigned. At over 257,000 acres it stands today as the fourth largest wildfire in the recorded history of California, 30 miles wide, west to east. Most of the blaze was in the Stanislaus National Forest but it spread into Yosemite National Park where it burned almost 79,000 acres of the Park’s back country, but never made it to the most visited area, Yosemite Valley.
CLICK HERE to see all of the articles on Wildfire Today about the Ferguson Fire, including the most recent.
The Ferguson Fire which as been burning for 10 days already has 2,900 personnel assigned and reached 30,000 acres Saturday. So far it has not destroyed any structures. As large as it was, the Rim Fire burned a surprisingly small number of structures — 11 homes, 3 commercial buildings, and 98 outbuildings. But if the Ferguson Fire grows east in a big way, several communities would be at risk, including El Portal, Foresta, Yosemite West, and possibly Wawona.
For the last week the Ferguson Fire has been slowed by inversions that typically do not break until mid-afternoon, after which it has been adding several thousand acres each day. If the weather changes and brings a strong wind with a westerly component, the complexion of the fire will change dramatically. In two days in mid-August, the Rim Fire burned nearly 90,000 acres.
Saturday night only four miles separated the Ferguson Fire from the footprint of the 2013 Rim Fire. If it does burn into it, the resistance to control should decrease, allowing firefighters a better chance to stop it in that area. If the north end of the Ferguson Fire spreads northeast three miles it will burn into Yosemite National Park. From that point, Yosemite Valley would be 13 miles to the east.
The Fire History map the Incident Management Team uploaded to InciWeb on July 21 is very cluttered and extremely difficult to decipher, but there have been some fires in the last 20 to 40 years years north of Highway 140 and east of the Ferguson Fire which, to a certain extent, may help firefighters a bit.
With fewer aircraft available this year, and 14,000 firefighters already committed, suppressing multiple new large fires could be a challenge.
Red Flag Warning July 22, 2018
While Southwest Oregon is still dealing with the lightning-caused fires that started a week ago, forecasters expect another round of lightning starting Sunday afternoon. The locations affected will be Southwest Oregon and Northern California, including National Forests in the area: Siskiyou, Rogue River, Shasta-Trinity, Fremont-Winema, and Klamath.
The best chance for lightning is Sunday, but it could linger through Tuesday.
Adding to the lightning threat is low relative humidity which is expected to reach into the teens in most locations Sunday.
And piling on to the wildfire danger is the current condition of the fuels. Oregon and Washington are at or over the historic high Energy Release Component (ERC). The ERC is a number related to the available energy (BTU) per unit area (square foot) within the flaming front at the head of a fire. A high ERC indicates more resistance to control — fires are harder to suppress.
With large numbers of firefighting resources already tied up on fires in Oregon, Utah, and California another flurry of rapidly spreading fires could severely test the mobilization capacity of the wildland firefighting agencies. Today over 14,000 personnel are committed to fires, including 362 hand crews, 926 engines, and 126 helicopters.
When do YOU think we will move to PL 5 this year? And, will there be a “Moses Letter” this year?
The National MAC Group just moved the national fire Preparedness Level up to 4, “due to increased significant wildland fire activity from central TX to WA state, the commitment of IMTs, and the potential for new wildland fires across multiple GACCs”. The highest level is 5.
National mobilization is heavily committed and measures need to be taken to support [Geographic Areas]. Active GA’s must take emergency measures to sustain incident operations.
– Full commitment of national resources is ongoing.
– Resource orders filled at NICC by specifically coordinating requests with GACCs as resources become available.
– Potential for emerging significant wildland fires is high and expected to remain high in multiple geographic areas.
Please take our poll. Answers must be clicked by the end of the day on Monday, July 23, 2018.
When this year will the national preparedness level be moved to PL 5? The week of...
August 5 (35%, 123 Votes)
August 12 (27%, 94 Votes)
July 29 (17%, 60 Votes)
August 19 (9%, 32 Votes)
It won't move to PL 5 (7%, 24 Votes)
July 22 (2%, 8 Votes)
September 2 or after (2%, 7 Votes)
August 26 (1%, 4 Votes)
Total Voters: 352
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Sometimes when we’re in PL 4 or 5 the honchos in Washington will distribute a “Moses Letter”, telling regional and local units to Let My People Go so they can go fight fire and save lives.
Exodus 8:1
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go in to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Let my people go, that they may serve me.”
Of course they don’t actually CALL IT a “Moses Letter” and probably won’t quote the Bible if they do send one, but we are in a new norm now, for many reasons.
For bonus points, let us know in the comments if you think the folks in the head shed will send a Moses Letter this year.
This was the prediction for the distribution of smoke from wildfires at 1 p.m. PDT July 21, 2018. Much of the smoke is coming from the fires in Southwest Oregon and the Ferguson Fire near Yosemite National Park in California.
Areas getting hit hardest by the smoke are in Oregon, Nevada, California, and Montana.
These fires in Southwest Oregon are arrayed in an interesting pattern. Most if not all of them I believe were caused by some of the 2,800 lightning strikes in the state last weekend. It makes you wonder if they were generated by an intense thunderstorm cell that moved northeast across that part of the state.
The red dots represent heat detected by a satellite at 3:59 a.m. PDT Saturday July 21.
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