Forest Fires in the United States: 11 October 1999

Forest Fires in the United States

11 October 1999


The National Interagency Fire Center reported on 8 October 1999 that California is the only state reporting large fire activity today, however, very high to extreme fire conditions were reported from Oregon, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Indiana and Georgia as well.

Fire Weather Outlook
A red flag warming is posted in southern California for low relative humidities and gusty north winds.
High pressure centered over the Great Basin will produce gusty Santa Ana winds up to 40 mph with very low relative humidity. Temperatures will range from the 90s to near 100 degrees around the inland areas of southern California.
A Pacific storm along the Canadian border will spread clouds and rain from the northern Oregon and Washington coasts into the Intermountain region today.

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Fig. 1. Large Wildland Fires in the United States, 8 October 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.

The latest IAMS image of active fires in Alaska is shown in a map of 5 October 1999.

Several active fire signals are recorded by OSEI with the NOAA-14 POES AVHRR HRPT satellite on 8 October 1999 in California.

click here to enlarge (309 KB)

Fig. 2. The image shows hot spots and dense smoke from areas of fire that continue to burn southeast of Monterey in western California.
(Source: NOAA http://www.osei.noaa.gov/)

According the INCIDENT MANAGEMENT SITUATION REPORT the current situation for 10 October 1999 can be quoted as follows:

“…
CURRENT SITUATION
Minimal initial attack activity was reported from all Geographic Areas. New large fire activity was reported in the Eastern Great Basin Area. Containment objectives continue to be met on fires in the Southern California Area. The National Interagency Coordination Center mobilized an airtanker, infrared aircraft and miscellaneous overhead. Very high to extreme fire indices were reported in Oregon, California, Utah, Idaho, Colorado and Georgia.

OUTLOOK:
High pressure will dominate the weather for the western U.S. today, resulting in continued dry conditions and normal daytime winds. After a few morning coastal clouds, sunny skies will prevail over the entire west. Maximum temperatures will range from the 60’s in the coastal areas, to the 70’s and 80’s inland, and 90’s in the southern California inland areas. Minimum relative humidities will range from 50 to 70 percent along the coast, to 5 to 35 percent inland.
A cold front extending from the Ohio river valley southwest to Texas will move east through the Gulf states. Widespread showers and thunderstorms will prevail east of the frontal band from Mississippi to Georgia. High pressure in Oklahoma and Texas will spread drying conditions and decreasing clouds into eastern Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana. Maximum temperatures will be mostly in the 80’s. Minimum relative humidities will range from 70 to 80 percent ahead of the frontal system in the eastern gulf states, to 30 to 50 percent west of the frontal system.
… .”

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 44 2,232 78,241 2,080,651

For detailed information regarding specified regions, please refer to the whole report.


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