Although it’s got virtually zero national news thus far, Spring Fire has exploded in Southern CO to over 100,000 acres burnt this morning, and could very easily break the all time record for largest fire recorded in CO’s history. It looks like I’m going to be a victim of that fire, but not looking for sympathy; only if others may have a better way to fight these fires.
First five days, I was told it was too dangerous to have boots on ground, so their presence was limited. I was also told with gusts at 60 mph winds, it was too dangerous to do air drops at that time, and that was also very limited.
Let’s start with that. Pilots fly in 150 mph hurricanes to gather data, and I imagine the visibility is about as piss poor as you can get. What other factors are involved to keep fire fighters from making their air drops?
What about using explosives? If it’ll blow out an oil well fire, why isn’t that considered?
I haven’t researched this any, just frustrated, and talking off the top of my head. But wondering what others could possibly come up with.
Sadly, the best option is to let small fires burn.
By aggressively fighting all fires, undergrowth and litter is permitted to build up, which makes subsequent fires much more destructive.
Of course, climate change is going to make forest fires worse in the future, so that needs to be taken into consideration.
Pilots flying in tropical storms aren’t doing so in close proximity to the ground. In aviation, the ground is your primary enemy. Fire suppression drops have to be done from ridiculously low altitude or it doesn’t work. So comparing it to hurricane hunting is pointless.
The idea with explosives and oil wells is that the gases created during the detonation (i.e. the chemical products of the detonating explosive itself) displace atmospheric air; at the same time, they displace the burning oil from the unburned oil, kind of like blowing out a candle.
The preparation before all of this involves aggressively hosing down the wellhead and everything else around it to cool it all off so that it can’t reignite the gushing oil right away.
All of that works because the oil well is basically a point source: cool off this wellhead and everything within a 50’ radius, detonate one charge, and the fire goes out.
A wildfire is not a point source; it’s more of a line. If you try to cool one spot down for your explosive trick, it’ll reignite from the burning material on either side. Also, unlike a burning oil well, the burn zone is moving, so you can’t do all this preparation in one area. Finally, the problem with a burning oil well is that the well itself is bringing up a steady supply of fuel. In a wildfire, you don’t have that problem: it’s easier to interrupt the fuel supply, e.g. by digging fire breaks or setting back-burns. Also, if you try to cool a spot down below the ignition temperature in preparation for your explosive trick, then you’ve already solved the problem: the fire’s out, and you now have no need for explosives.
I think the answer is to curtail sprawling construction and encourage more population density so that homes and people aren’t so often put in the paths of forest fires.
I agree with poster #2–there are so many big wildfires because there aren’t enough small wildfires to burn off the leaf litter and undergrowth before it builds to massive levels. Periodicly burn off the debris before they get thick enough that a fire would be hot enough to hurt the trees, too.
Living in NW Montana we live in fear of what we are all seeing in CO today. It has already been mentioned that letting small fires burn in order to reduce the fuel levels would really help, since fire is part of a healthy natural forest ecosystem, that’s often hard to do when people and structures are directly impacted. The other thing we could do is focus a lot more resources on these fires before they blow up, but that’s also hard to do given the terrain they sometimes start in and the limited human and non-human resources available to fight wildfires. It’s seems once they grow to 30-40,000 acres it becomes much harder to contain them and it typically means only trying to save structures, people and livestock and basically letting the fire burn until the weather significantly slows the fire progress. If we could somehow create rain over the fire that would sure help…
Maybe those are problems that can be overcome. Add some sort of thickener to the fire retardant so it can be dropped from higher altitude with dispersing too much, put it in some kind of guided projectile that can deliver it to the right spot, or create unmanned water bombers that can accept the risk of low-level flights. None of those would be easy to implement, and it may turn out that none of them would work or be worth the cost, but we don’t have to just accept things as they are.
Get to small fires fast with a form of retardant that keeps the burn rate slow but does not stop it so it can burn along the ground getting the bad ground cover but not harming the mature trees.
Would have to respond to every smoke so cost comes into it in a big way for to get there quick, day & night means airplanes and a supply of the retardant close enough to make the round trip effective soon enough that the fire never grows to a full tree eating fire.
I’ve got to get that t-shirt. Many Australians do just that, fight it themselves, and they are very successful at it, so much in fact, some states in the US are wanting to adopt their ways. I needed about two more years before I would have been able to move in permanently and would have had a system in place that I think would have been very effective in saving my structure.
I’m quite familiar with this argument of letting it burn out, seems so drastic, even more so when it hits closer to home, but proponents do seem to make a fairly good case of it. I was apart of old growth forest. It was covered in mature yellow pine, ponderosa pine, aspen and spruce trees, many were over 100’ tall. The wildlife in my area was amazing. I just hope my bears made it out. They were great neighbors.
Maybe it’ll slow down the pine beetle population which has been creating havoc on the forests of the Rocky Mountains for some time. We need our temperatures to start getting down well below zero again for longer periods to wipe this pesk out. Global warming certainly isn’t helping the situation. I’m sure the pine beetle helped contribute to the intensity of the fires. Some estimated flames as high as 300’. I had three deer cameras placed around my cabin. If the SD cards survived, it’ll be interesting what it captured.
Since my OP, I dug around to see if others were trying anything else. Seen one site that talked of a NM study that uses a blast creating so much air that it knocks the fire off of its fuel source. It said they were quietly optimistic about it. Seen quite a few sites that suggest using liquid nitrogen, and that the military is very successful using it, but it comes down to costs. Still might be cost effective in certain situations, but haven’t looked into it hardly at all. Link for it.
Yes, that would be a good step in effectively managing forests. But for those times when there’s no choice but to fight a wildfire, it would be nice to have effective tools to do it with.
*Fire ecologist Melissa Forder says about 60 percent of fires in national parks are caused by humans: “intentionally set fires, buildings burning and spreading into the forest, smoking, equipment malfunctions and campfires.”
But the average for all forests is even higher. The latest research shows that nationwide, humans cause more than 8 in 10 — 84 percent.*
It seems we cannot well control humans building structures in risky areas, and we will never be able to control human activity that accidentally sparks wildfires. What we can do is develop a year-round prescribed-burn program in areas at risk for wildfire, as well as letting fires burn on their own when solely in wild areas. I don’t know how much a difference it would make, but the current approach seems to be effective at treating the problem more than prevention.
A prescribed-burn program is going to cost $$. Are communities threatened by wildfires going to pony-up?
My uncle was a firefighter, and my cousin works with the NWS. He used to do forecasting for smoke jumpers, and fire forecasting for the State of CA. I’ll take a whack at your question.
First up, comparing fire fighting flights to hurricane flights is very much an apples to oranges comparison. The type of aircraft is very different. In most cases, firefighting crafts are maneuverable, and are modified for dropping water or retardant on a fire. They fly much more slowly than weather chasing planes. A hurricane plane is a jet. It flies higher, and its engines are much stronger. It’s able to maintain thrust against the hurricane in a way that firefighting equipment couldn’t manage. On the other hand, it would be thoroughly impractical for fighting fires.
Visibility is one factor that grounds fire fighting aircraft. In some weather conditions, the smoke is such that the pilots can’t see to fly or where to drop. Some weather conditions by themselves impact visibility or make conditions to dangerous for fancy flying (low clouds with downpours, for example). This isn’t instrumentation flying, where they can fly blind. If they’re in the mountains, where you get insane wind gusts whipping around peaks, this is even more true. Aircraft can be flipped into a mountain in seconds. Night will usually stop fire fighting fights for visibility reasons. Last, but not least, fires can create their own weather and/or weather effects, given the right conditions or if they get large enough. Any of those factors might have been in play in the decision not to fly.
As was this one. A 52 year old man was arrested for arson some days ago. He was actually the one that called it in. He first said he was burning trash, then changed his story he was cooking on his outside grille. I understand rarely are people charged with arson, unless it is for gross negligence.
Your explanation as well as another’s helps a bit. I’m just a fair weather flyer, don’t really do much mtn flying, mostly a flatlander. I have been up in 45+ mph gusts. As long as wind is down the runway, I’m good, makes for shorter TO&L. You reminded me about the mtns, and it refreshed what I was taught about a strong wind down a leeward side, one needs to add at least a 1,000’ or more, and IIRC, some were recommending 1.5X the height of the mtn to be extra safe to pass, and not be completely drawn down.
Seeing light rain on the live cams for both La Veta Pass and Cuchura as I write this. Cabin is, or I should say, was just a few miles from the Pass. Nature didn’t start this one, but maybe it will help assist or put this one entirely out. Don’t think I’ll ever use the phrase, “Mother Nature” ever again though.
There are effective tools (firetrucks, airplane tankers, dozers, firefighters…) and a major part of the solution is to get more of them. But that costs money and “let’s not raise taxes”.
A couple of these might do it. I’d love to have seen a few of these in action in my county. Called Big Wind, two MIG jet engines hooked up on a 46,000 lb tank that delivers 27,000 lbs of thrust, and 8,000 gpm. Video says these were used to extinguish the fires in Kuwait when Hussein set the oil fields on fire. Can’t imagine the logistics involved. Doesn’t really show it in action until about the 2:10 mark, and looks like it takes maybe 20 seconds or so for each well, not sure. For a forest fire, it would have to stay running, damn thing could drain lakes, or would need almost an endless supply of 18 wheeler tankers feeding it. Quite an appetite. I can hear the governor of a state saying now, the good news, is, we were able to put out the fire in a reasonable amount of time. Bad news, is, several counties are now out of water.
Grassland, scrub brush fires, and forest fires used to move through these areas on an almost annual schedule as a normal part of the cycle. Now we build housing developments in areas where they should not be. In the forest, on the hill sides, in the scrub. The brush builds up and the fires that would burn through this brush in the past no longer clear the area.
So when the inevitable wild fire breaks out, it burns millions of dollars of structures that should never have been built there in the first place.
I’d love to have seen a few of these in action in my county. Called