Wildfires - smoke

[flusher]

Air quality has been really bad here in Sacramento for the past 2 weeks. Getting smoke from the Carr fire in Redding North of here and the big fires in Mendocino County West of here.

 

[oosik]

Well - here we are - and as promised - no stink, very little smoke and no visible ash. The wind has changed direction - I KNOW all the fires are not out. Winds are out of the ESE.
I will enjoy while it lasts.

 

[Jchonline]

Watched an interesting video on CA wildfires. Juan Brown is a 777 pilot and CA native. He did a great job covering Orville Dam as well. Enjoy. CA Wildfires

 

[ericm979]

There's a lot of factors leading to the increased fire activity we're having. A century of fire supression has left a lot more fuel in forests. To me (I was a wildland fire fighter and studied fire ecology) that's probably the main factor. It's been a problem for a while- land managers knew about it in the 1980s and probably longer than that. But climate change is also a factor in making the fires worse. There's been a lot of beetle kill in the forests in California in the last ~10 years. That adds to the fuel load. It's hotter both during the day and at night. Ambient temperature affects wildfire behaviour in a big way. When the ambient temp is hotter everything starts that much closer to ignition temperature. Twenty degrees makes a difference that is noticeable to a firefighter on the line. Hotter average temps also dry vegetation out faster. Fuel moisture is another major factor in fire intensity and speed- dry fuel ignites easier and burns hotter. So I'm going to disagree with someone who says that climate change isn't making fires worse. It's not the only cause but it is certainly a factor.

We should be doing more control burns and thinning where control burns are not practical like in populated areas. But those take money and the political climate for the last 30 years has been to reduce the amount of money going to the public agencies who manage most of the western forests. It's been worst under Republican administrations but Democratic ones have not been a whole lot better. Politically it is difficult to spend money now to address a problem that may not happen in a given area until the politician is long out of office. So I do not forsee a significant change in my lifetime. If you have property in a forested area you should examine your fire readiness. I'm doing a lot to make my place more likely to survive. Besides clearing brush and trees I'm rebuilding the house's exterior with more fire resistant materials.

 

[Jchonline]

I agree heat doesn’t help. You didn’t mention wind conditions, or lack of commercial logging. Perhaps these also contribute. CA has some tough choices ahead.

 

[ericm979]

I don't know of any change in winds. There might be one due to climate change, I just haven't heard of it. Big mature trees are the most resistant to fire. Smaller trees burn more easily and a fire in one can crown out more readily and then ladder into the larger trees. Clear cut logging wouldreduce fire danger until the replanted trees (and brush if it's not treated) grows for a few years. Then it's worse than a mature forest until it becomes one. And clear cutting has other downsides. Select cutting removes the most valuable trees, which are also the ones that are most resistant to fire. So it doesn't help either. Removing the large number of beetle kill trees would help reduce the fuel load but after a few years they're not worth much commercially (if at all as beetle kill wood is often stained). Even if the USFS green lighted all logging the loggers would not be able to get to more than a fraction of them while they're worth something. I have seen harvesting start really quick on fire killed trees... like when the fire's just contained not officially out. I don't blame the build up of fuels on a lack of logging. We're already logging about as much as we can given the prices of timber (making some trees uneconomical to harvest) and wanting to leave forests for future generations to enjoy and harvest.

 

[WM75Guy]

We had a cold front come through last weekend that brought us the smoke from California. Definitely see the haze. It has dropped the temps from the high 90s to the low 90s this week. Supposed to clear out by Friday.

 

[oosik]

It stayed clear all day and actually got hot this afternoon. Still looks good and smells just fine as night closes in around us here. Many certainly are not that fortunate.

 

[cqaigy2]

We lost the smoke for a few hours, the sky was blue, couldn't smell any smoke, it was wonderful. But its back to eye stinging levels.

 

[oosik]

Its 5AM - sky is clear and its a cool 53F. I knock on wood because this might be the second day in a row without the smoke, ash & crud. Wind is out of the south and has been for the last ten hours. Must be little or nothing burning down that direction. You know - if this were a game - we surely would be loosing. God bless the fire fighters - each and every one.