News and opinion about wildland fire
These photos of Devils Tower National Monument were taken a month apart.
And from a historical perspective, the photo below was taken on the other side, the west side, of the Monument in May, 2000 a few weeks after a prescribed fire. The fire was in the foreground — the area beyond the road in the background was not part of the project.
The Rocky Mountain Geographic Area Incident Management Teams are holding their annual meetings in Cheyenne, Wyoming this week. Team “C” took a little time off to pose for this photo, which is via @RMIMTeamC. Click the photo to see a larger version.
Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories Uncategorized2 Comments on Wyoming: have wildfires early, because the state may run out of money “I don’t want to tell the counties to have fires early because we’re going to run out of money,”
Wyoming Governor Matt Mead, referring to his budget request for wildland fire suppression being cut in half.
The Wyoming state Legislature’s Joint Appropriations Committee cut Governor Matt Mead’s $60 million request for wildland fire suppression this year in half. In 2012 the state spent $45 million to fight fires and the governor expects this year to be at least as bad if not worse than last year. The committee told him that he can make up for the $30 million difference by taking money from other state agencies.
Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories Uncategorized5 Comments on Hotshot Crew videos, 2012 fire season At least a couple of hotshot crews have put together videos summarizing their fire seasons this year. This first one is from the Wyoming Hotshots and is called “Part 1”, covering fires in Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska and Colorado. It includes some excellent photographs and skilled editing. HERE is a link to their videos from 2011.
The video below is from the Lone Peak Hotshots’ 2012 fire season. If you don’t think you’ll enjoy seeing blisters on a person’s foot being lanced with a pocket knife, skip the first 35 seconds.
Let us know if you are aware of any other good videos summarizing the 2012 fire season.
Update December 28. We have more here.
A weather forecast for record-breaking triple-digit heat and single digit humidities has brought out a red flag warning for some areas in southern California for Monday and Tuesday. The temperatures are expected to be about 20 degrees hotter than normal, between 95 and 105 at the lower elevations in the mountains of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties on Monday, then a few degrees cooler on Tuesday. Downtown Los Angeles is expected to hit 100 degrees on Monday, with it reaching 105 degrees in Burbank and Pasadena.
Northeast winds at 10 to 20 mph with 30 mph gusts are expected on Monday, with Tuesday afternoon bringing 25 mph onshore winds.
The map below shows the area in southern California covered by the red flag warning, which is in effect from 6 a.m. Monday until 6 p.m. PDT Tuesday.
There is also a red flag warning for some areas in northwest Montana for gusty winds and low humidities from 11 a.m. through midnight MDT on Monday. The winds are expected to be southwest at 15 to 25 mph with gusts up to 50, with the humidities as low as 16 percent.
The passage of a cold front has resulted in a red flag warning for western Minnesota from 2 p.m. until 7 p.m. CDT on Monday. Winds should be northwest at 20 with gusts up to 30 mph along with humidities as low as 20 percent.
A fire weather watch is in effect for areas in Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories Uncategorized1 Comment on Alpine Lake Fire spreads 6 miles on Friday and Saturday 
The Alpine Lake fire 40 miles west of Riverton, Wyoming had been relatively quiet for the last ten days until it made some very significant runs on Friday and Saturday. On those days it showed extreme fire behavior, was plume-dominated, and spread six miles to the east adding about 11,000 acres, bringing the size to 34,630 acres. The Red Flag Warning that was in effect for the area turned out to be accurate, as the fire was influenced by extremely low relatively humidity. On Saturday the highest RH recorded at the Wind River weather station (12 miles southeast of the fire) for the 24-hour period was 17 percent at 11 p.m. Between 4 a.m. and 3 p.m. the RH was in the single digits, with the lowest reading of 6 percent occurring at 4 a.m. It remained quite low Saturday night and Sunday morning, finally getting as high as 25 percent at 7 a.m. on Sunday before it started decreasing again.
This weather contributed to the extreme fire behavior and rapid spread of the fire all day Saturday and continuing late into Saturday night.
We talked with Karl Brauneis, a former US Forest Service employee who is assigned as an Information Officer to the fire, which is burning on Bureau of Indian Affairs land.
Mr. Brauneis told us that since the fire started on August 7, the result of a lightning strike, it was managed by four to five people plus a helicopter and a helitack crew until they experimented with a Type 2 Incident Management Team for a short time beginning on September 7. He said the IMTeam was “too heavy” and “too muscled up” for the fire and was released. But after the fire activity increased later, they brought in a smaller Type 3 IMTeam, with Mike Hosstetler as Incident Commander.
Mr. Brauneis said the topography is extremely rugged, the area has no logging or grazing activity, and there is no wildland-urban interface. He described it as a “pre-Louis and Clark landscape”, meaning there is no development or any human-made improvements that have to be protected. Those factors, he explained, make it nearly impossible and not necessary to suppress the fire. When it burns down from the 8,000 to 10,000 foot elevations to the sage and grass on the lower slopes, which it is beginning to do now, they will be able to take suppression action. At that time the firefighters will engage the fire more aggressively, protecting the Saint Lawrence Basin and the Saint Lawrence Basin Ranger Station.
In fact on Saturday air tankers were used for the first time on the fire and included retardant drops from Tanker 911, a DC-10, as well as some single engine air tankers. They expect to use air tankers again on the fire today.
The video below was uploaded by KTWO News on September 7.
