Forest Fires in the United States
22 September 1999
The National Interagency Fire Center reported on 21 September 1999 that new fires ignited in Texas and Idaho, while large fires continue to burn actively in California.
Fire Weather Outlook
Most of the West will experience dry and warm conditions today with light winds.
Isolated storms are expected in northern California into northern Nevada Utah and
southwest Colorado.
Texas will be dry and windy the next few days.
Fig. 1. Large Wildland Fires in the United States, 20
September 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, 21
September 1999
(Source: BLM - Alaska Fire Service )
Several active fire signals are recorded by OSEI with the NOAA-15 POES AVHRR HRPT satellite on 21 September 1999 in California.
Fig. 3. The image shows heat signatures from large
areas of fire burning in western California and smaller areas in Oregon.
(Source: NOAA http://www.osei.noaa.gov/)
According the INCIDENT MANAGEMENT SITUATION REPORT the current situation for 21 September 1999 can be quoted as follows:
"...
CURRENT SITUATION
Initial attack activity was heavy in the Southern Area and minimal in the rest of the
United States. New large fire activity was reported in the Northern Rockies, Southern and
Eastern Areas. Large fire activity continued in California and the Southern Area. The
National Interagency Coordination Center mobilized infrared aircraft, helicopters,
telecommunications equipment, a caterer, crews, and miscellaneous overhead.
Very high to extreme fire indices were reported in Oregon, Washington, California, Idaho,
Montana, Utah, South Dakota, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas.
OUTLOOK:
An upper level ridge will dominate most of the northern tier states and the Great Basin,
with a surface high pressure over Colorado and Wyoming. A surface low pressure trough
dominates along the Pacific Coast from California through Washington. Mostly sunny
conditions are expected over eastern Oregon, southern Idaho and northern Nevada. Relative
humidities will range from 10 to 20 percent with few single digit readings.
Tropical moisture from hurricane Hilary will overspread Arizona, southern California,
southern Nevada, southern Utah and western New Mexico with scattered wet thunderstorms in
the afternoon. On the fringes of this moisture, isolated thunderstorms will occur over an
arc from the Sierra Nevada mountains across northern Nevada, Utah and into southwestern
Colorado.
A cold front stretching along the Ohio river to Arkansas to north-central Texas this
morning, will move across the region and over the gulf of Mexico by evening. Ahead of the
front especially over Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana, there will be scattered showers.
Over Texas, the front will be dry with only partly cloudy skies. Behind the front will be
breezy conditions with north to northwest winds 10 to 20 MPH.
... ."
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 |
| 328 | 5,461 | 76,711 | 1,922,870 |
For detailed information regarding specified regions, please refer to the whole report.