Forest Fires in the United States
27 August 1999
Across the western United States, thousands of firefighters are battling blazes. Lightning, wind, 100-degree heat and low humidity have fueled the flames. In California, firefighters continued to battle an estimated 100 fires around the northeastern part of the state sparked by a number of lightning strikes Saturday. More than 16,190 hectares have burned. About 300 wildfires, mostly caused by lightning, were raging in California, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Idaho. In Northern California, heavy smoke from approximately 100 blazes drifted through the Central Valley, adding a choking haze to triple-digit heat in Sacramento. Lightning also caused fires that burned nearly 2,500 ha in two wilderness areas of Yosemite National Park.
The National
Interagency Fire Center reported on 26 August 1999 that
there are 29 large fires burning in California, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Texas,
Utah, and Washington for a total of about 50,000 ha. The areas of fire are shown in the
large fire map below. Throughout the West several areas are experiencing significant large
fires. Northern California continues to battle nine large fire complexes. In California,
Nevada and Montana several fires were extremely active and threatened private property and
natural resources. Hot and dry conditions, as well as isolated thunderstorms are expected
across Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas today. States in the Southwest, including Utah, New
Mexico, Arizona and Colorado are expected to receive mainly wet thunderstorms.
Fig. 1. Large Wildland Fires in the United States, 26
August 1999
(National Interagency Fire
Center)
For more information please refer to the website of National Interagency Fire Center.
The BLM - Alaska Fire Service Initial Attack Management System (IAMS) is suite of computer applications developed by BLM/Fire to aid dispatchers and fire managers. IAMS Maps is one of these applications and provides graphical representation of various kinds of geographic data. Maps has been modified to produce output to a Web site to allow internet access to the data that IAMS stores. Dynamic data such as lightning (available May - September), fires, etc. are updated at the homepage of the BLM - Alaska Fire Service (select Maps / AFS IAMS Maps Viewer) every 15 minutes during the fire season.
Fig.2. IAMS image of active fires in Alaska, 26 August
1999
(Source: BLM - Alaska Fire Service )
According the INCIDENT MANAGEMENT SITUATION REPORT the current situation for 26 August 1999 can be quoted as follows:
"...
CURRENT SITUATION
Large fire activity continued in the Western Great Basin and California Areas as hot and
dry weather conditions prevailed. New large fire activity was reported in the Northwest,
California, Eastern Great Basin and Northern Rockies Areas. Initial attack activity
decreased and was moderate in most areas.
Competition exists for airtankers, leadplanes, type I and II helicopters and type I crews.
The National Interagency Coordination Center mobilized airtankers, helicopters, lead
planes, infrared aircraft, radio equipment, caterers, showers, engines, crews,
smokejumpers and miscellaneous overhead. Very high to extreme fire indices were
reported in Oregon, Washington, California, Montana, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, South Dakota,
Wyoming, Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas.
OUTLOOK:
A fire weather watch is posted for dry lightning this afterenoon through midnight
for northern California, south-central Oregon and northern Nevada.
High pressure is building from the four corners area. At the same time a
deepening thermal low at the surface will allow monsoon moisture to spread north. This
will result in a few high based dry thunderstorms across northern California, northern
Nevada, northern Utah, southern Oregon and southern Idaho. Farther south thunderstorms are
expected to be scattered and mainly wet. The same high pressure will maintain hot and dry
weather with isolated afternoon thunderstorms across Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.
Temperatures will be one to five degrees warmer and humidities will be drier with minimum
readings in the single digits and teens across the Great Basin, northern California,
eastern Oregon and southern Idaho. Humidities will be in the teens and 20's across
Northern Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas. The trend remains for warming and drying.
..."
Following basic fire data describe the fire situation in the United States:
| Number of FIRES in the last 24 hours | HECTARES burning in the last 24 hours | FIRES YEAR-TO-DATE |
HECTARES YEAR-TO-DATE |
| 296 | 13,991 | 68,427 | 1,652,498 |
For detailed information regarding specified regions, please refer to the whole report.