Forest Fires in the United States: 12 August 1999
Forest Fires in the United States
12 August 1999
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.1. IAMS image of active fires in Alaska, 11 August 1999
(Source: BLM – Alaska Fire Service )
According the INCIDENT MANAGEMENT SITUATION REPORT the current situation for 12 August 1999 can be quoted as follows:
“…
CURRENT SITUATION:
Good progress was made on large fires in the Northwest and the Northern Rockies Areas. Moderate initial attack activity was reported in the Northern California and Northwest Areas. Very high to extreme fire indices were reported in Oregon, Washington, California, Montana, North Dakota, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Oklahoma, and West Virginia.
OUTLOOK:
An upper level low pressure area will move from the Great Basin into the upper plains this morning. Residual moisture from the low pressure area, coupled with surface heating will bring the chance of scattered showers and thunderstorms to the Great Basin this afternoon.
Another upper level low pressure area will form off the pacific northwest coast which will generate scattered showers and thunderstorms along the Cascades.
High temperatures will be in the 60’s along the coast, mid 60’s to the lower 80’s in the mountains, mid 80’s to upper 90’s in the lower valleys of north and central Nevada, and near 105 in southern Nevada.
Minimum relative humidities will range from 50 percent along the coast to around 20 percent in the inland valleys. Winds will be light away from the thunderstorms.
…”
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 275 4,260 62,823 1,541,378
For detailed information regarding specified regions, please refer to the whole report.
