Lightning during the 24-hour period ending at 6:44 a.m. PDT Sept. 10, 2021. The red strikes are the most recent.
Lightning, strong winds, and showers moved into California, Nevada, and Oregon Thursday afternoon. Friday morning at about 7 a.m. the National Weather Service reported approximately 1,100 ground strikes had occurred in California.
Most of Northern California and Central Oregon received at least a small amount of rain. While some weather stations recorded none or less than 0.05″ others measured more than 0.25″.
Precipitation, Western US, 24 hours ending at 7:10 am PDT Sept. 10, 2021.
All of the precipitation amounts below are for the 24-hour period ending at 7:10 a.m. PDT Sept. 10.
Maps of precipitation in California and Oregon–
Precipitation, Northern California, 24 hours ending at 7:10 am PDT Sept. 10, 2021.Precipitation, Oregon, 24 hours ending at 7:10 am PDT Sept. 10, 2021
Southeast of Susanville, California three miles southeast of Herlong Junction
9:45 a.m. PDT Sept. 7, 2021
Dixie Fire 3-D map. Looking northwest at the escarpment along US Highway 395 at 8:29 p.m. PDT Sept 6, 2021. Bright red areas had intense heat during the mapping flight.
Monday afternoon and evening the southeast side of the huge 917,000-acre Dixie Fire ran to the east pushed by variable winds down a steep escarpment and across US Highway 395. During an 8:29 p.m. mapping flight the fire stretched for a mile along the west side of the highway and for about half that distance had burned across the road. At that time it had not spread very far beyond the highway as it moved into agricultural land. The fire reached US 395 south of Honey Lake three miles southeast of Herlong Junction between roads A25 and A26.
Dixie Fire map, southeast side where by 8:29 p.m. PDT Sept. 6, 2021 the fire had reached and crossed US Highway 395. Bright red areas had intense heat during the mapping flight.Dixie Fire 8:29 p.m. PDT Sept 6, 2021.
The north side of the fire is also active. At least half of Lassen Volcanic National Park has burned. Within the park on Monday the fire was making a push to the north and northeast across the park boundary south of Badger Mountain. It was also very active around Prospect and West Prospect Peaks within and just north of the park.
Dixie Fire map, north side, 8:29 p.m. PDT Sept. 6, 2021. Bright red areas had intense heat during the mapping flight.
West of Highway 44 south of the Bogard Rest Area there were three spot fires Monday night about half a mile west of the highway that combined had burned approximately 130 acres as of sunset on Monday.
On Tuesday crews will continue to complete line in the steep and rugged terrain in the wilderness of Lassen National Volcanic Park and are establishing direct and indirect containment lines south of Old Station utilizing lines created during the 2012 Reading Fire.
Firefighters are preparing for increased fire danger due to predicted strong winds. The forecast for the north side of the fire calls for southwest winds gusting around 20 mph or more every afternoon through Friday with relative humidities close to 20 percent.
Two engine crews and a dozer install 16,000 feet of hose on the Dixie Fire. CAL FIRE photo.
The hardest part of installing long hose lays in rugged terrain is hauling the hose, and it is usually uphill. When the plans called for 16,000 feet of hose to be installed on the Dixie Fire it just took two engine crews and some ingenuity to get it done. They enlisted the help of dozer E2085 from Paula and sons Earthwork.
The CAL FIRE crews were Lassen Modoc engines E2271 and E2251.
Two engine crews and a dozer install 16,000 feet of hose on the Dixie Fire. CAL FIRE photo.Two engine crews and a dozer install 16,000 feet of hose on the Dixie Fire. CAL FIRE photo.Two engine crews and a dozer install 16,000 feet of hose on the Dixie Fire. CAL FIRE photo.
One day in the not too distant future it will become routine to haul hose with drones.
To see all articles on Wildfire Today about the Dixie Fire, including the most recent, click here.
Active duty US Army soldiers receive fire training before assisting at the Dixie Fire Sept. 1, 2021. About 200 soldiers have been activated to assist with wildfires in California. InciWeb.
Two firefighters assigned to wildfires in California have died.
One of two emails sent to employees on the Stanislaus National Forest about the fatality of one of their employee/retirees said he “passed away earlier this week due to complications of COVID-19 while assigned to the French Fire near Kernville, CA. He had been hospitalized in Bakersfield.”
The person’s name has not been released by the Stanislaus, but at least three sources confirm it was Allen Johnson.
Allen Johnson. USFS.
Allen was a Forest Service retiree and was working as an Administratively Determined (AD) employee on the French Fire. The email to the forest’s staff said it’s very early in the process, but “Tentative plans for honoring Allen include a Dignified Transport of remains followed by a Memorial Service. To the best of our current knowledge, Allen’s dignified transport and Memorial Service will occur on or after September 26.”
California Interagency Incident Management Team 14 posted on Facebook Sept. 1, 2021, “Our team, the firefighting community, and the world lost a great friend, mentor, teacher and comrade last night. Retired South Central Sierra Interagency Incident Management Team IC and Liaison Officer Allen Johnson passed away from complications related to COVID 19.”
So in the absence of official information from the US Forest Service about this line of duty death, it appears from the post by his incident management team that Allen died August 31, 2021.
Saturday night NBC Bay Area reported another fatality — a US Forest Service firefighter assigned to the Dixie Fire near Susanville, California.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Forest Service told NBC Bay Area Saturday that the firefighter, an employee with the Lassen National Forest died from an illness. The official added that the firefighter’s death was not related to the fire. No other details have been released at this time.
The official information from CAL FIRE about the Dixie Fire confirms there was a first responder fatality from an illness on September 2.
UPDATE at 11:08 a.m. PDT Sept. 6, 2021: NEWS4 reported today that the US Forest Service said the firefighter that died who had been assigned to the Dixie Fire was Marcus Pacheco, an assistant fire engine operator for the Lassen NF with 30 years of fire experience. He passed away Sept. 2 from what the USFS is calling an "unspecified illness". Late at night on September 5 the Lassen National Forest created a post on Facebook announcing the two fatalities and confirming the names.
The Dixie Fire has burned more than 889,000 acres near Susanville, California and is still actively spreading.
The 25,000-acre French Fire is west of Kernville, California.
Last week a strike team of five engines with 16 firefighters on the Caldor Fire near Lake Tahoe was quarantined for two weeks due to one of their members testing positive for COVID. There have been other reports of firefighters and crews sidelined, quarantined, or sickened, but specifics are hard to come by.
Two weeks ago Wildfire Today asked the five federal land management agencies for the number of their firefighters that have tested positive for COVID or had to quarantine after exposure. All five refused to release any information on the topic and would not explain their reasoning for keeping it secret. On September 2 we asked the US Forest Service again for the numbers of their firefighters who have tested positive for COVID, were hospitalized, or died. We are still waiting for the answers.
We send out our sincere condolences to the family, friends, and co-workers of the two firefighters who passed away while on duty.
(Edited to include the names of the firefighters.)
Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to people who passed along this information.
The fire was mapped Wednesday night at 859,000 acres
8:55 a.m. PDT Sept. 2, 2021
Map of the southeast side of the Dixie Fire, 3-D map looking northwest at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 1, 2021, showing the escarpment above Highway 395. The blue areas are previous fires.
The southeast side of the Dixie Fire grew substantially to the northeast Wednesday pushed by 10 mph winds gusting up to 20 mph while the relative humidity was in the single digits. During a 7:30 mapping flight Wednesday night it was 2 miles west of Highway 395, threatening to cross the road again. There is already a 5 mile-long fire scar where it reached the highway a few weeks ago, crossing it in several places near Honey Lake south of Buntingville.
The fire is approaching the edge of the escarpment where the terrain drops rapidly 2,500 feet down to Highway 395, seen on the 3-D map above. Firefighting on that steep slope would be very difficult.
Dixie Fire map, southeast side, 7:30 p.m. Sept. 1, 2021
“It’s almost to the escarpment now,” said CAL FIRE Operations Section Chief Tony Brownell. “We’ve moved a lot of engines and personnel around, we are down around 395, concentrating on structure protection. So when it does come off that hill we are going to be there to catch it and keep it out of structures the best we can.”
To see all articles on Wildfire Today about the Dixie Fire, including the most recent, click HERE.
The fire has also reached the north edge of Lake Davis eight miles north of Portola which is on Highway 70.
The extreme fire behavior witnessed Wednesday is predicted to continue due to persistent winds and dry fuel conditions — near red flag warning criteria. The forecast for Thursday is for 7 to 13 mph winds out of the west-southwest gusting late in the afternoon up to 21 mph with the relative humidity in the teens.
Dixie Fire map, 7:30 p.m. Sept. 1, 2021. The blue areas are previous fires.
On the northeast side, which is still active about a mile south of Highway 44, approximately half of Lassen Volcanic National Park has burned.
The fire was mapped Wednesday night at 859,000 acres. At least 696 residences and 586 other structures have been confirmed as destroyed. Suppression costs have reached $432 million since it started near a PG&E power line July 14. Wednesday evening 4,039 personnel were committed to the incident.
Dixie Fire map, northwest section. The fire was mapped by a fixed wing aircraft at 8 p.m. Aug. 25, 2021. The red areas had extreme heat during the flight.
The Dixie Fire near Susanville, California has burned 747,091 acres and has run up fire suppression costs of more than $365 million. At last count 690 residences and 139 commercial buildings had been destroyed. A map is available showing which structures have been surveyed for damages.
There are two areas on the fire that had large concentrations of heat when the fire was mapped Wednesday night. One was the northeast section south of Highway 44, 6 miles southeast of Old Station. After burning much of the east side of Lassen Volcanic National Park the fire ran an additional three miles north. During the 8 p.m. mapping flight Wednesday night it was a mile south of Highway 44. The fire is still very active in the center of the park and outside its northeast corner.
Dixie Fire map, southeast section. The fire was mapped by a fixed wing aircraft at 8 p.m. Aug. 25, 2021. The red areas had extreme heat during the flight.
The other very active area on the Dixie fire is east of Taylorsville and around the Genesee Valley. Wednesday night hotshot crews continued to work the fire down off Mt. Jura to the valley bottom to secure Taylorsville. No spots have occurred. On Thursday resources will focus on holding this line. Crews have been actively engaged in structure protection in the Genesee Valley near Ward Creek and Little Grizzly Creek as the Peel Ridge spot fire backed down into the valley. They will continue this work Thursday.
(To see all articles on Wildfire Today about the Dixie Fire, including the most recent, click HERE.)
The Dixie Fire burned into the footprint of the 2019 Walker Fire, spreading for approximately a quarter of a mile inside, along 10 miles of Walker’s western perimeter.
On Thursday firefighters will construct direct and indirect line to secure fire lines in the Westwood area, which they expect will require a heavy resource presence.
Temperatures Thursday are expected to increase while winds from the north and northwest decrease to six mph out of the west-southwest. The relative humidity will be in the low 20s with very little cloud cover.
