Extreme heat and dry conditions have left dead or dried grass and other ready-to-burn plant material across tens of millions of acres.
Well above-normal wildfire activity and expanding drought conditions across the nation are fueling concerns about increasing fire danger in the weeks to come.
The landscape is “primed for fire,” the National Interagency Fire Center said in a recent update. The number of acres burned so far this year – 1,631,840 – is more than twice the 10-year average year-to-date. As of April 2, at least 17,568 wildfires have been reported, compared to an average of about 10,789.
Extreme heat and dry conditions have left dead or dried grass and other ready-to-burn plant material across tens of millions of acres, able to support rapid, wind-driven fires, the fire center wrote in one update. Large fires have burned in Florida, North Carolina and Nebraska. One Nebraska fire became the largest in state history after burning along 70 miles, according to NASA.
In the northern Plains, a “lack of snowfall and warmer temperatures dating back to October have put us in a precarious position,” said Gannon Rush, climatologist at the High Plains Regional Climate Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “We’re now in a situation where we are heavily reliant on having a wet spring. If that doesn’t happen, then it could be a rough year.”
The federal weather outlook for April indicated temperatures are likely to be above normal across much of the country, with below normal precipitation in most of the West and in Florida, the fire center said on April 1. Fuel moistures – an index of how ready things are to burn – are trending near record lows for the time of year in some areas.
On Friday, April 3, the National Weather Service warned of critical fire weather for more than 1.2 million people across parts of New Mexico, eastern Colorado and western Kansas. More than 5 million people were under red flag warnings for fire risk.
In the Southwest, it’s “exceptionally dry” in much of Arizona, New Mexico, southern Colorado and Utah, said Chris Field, director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. “There is a genuine concern that we’ll see an early and severe fire season there,” with the fires gradually moving north and west as summer progresses.
In the Southeast, more than 14,000 fires have been reported so far this year, with another 2,000 in the East, according to the fire center’s daily report. However, the 310 fires in the Rocky Mountain region have burned the largest area, nearly a million acres.
A range of factors contribute to the increase in fire activity and wildfire danger, Field said. That includes both climate change and short-term weather, as well as issues with land and forest management and development in regions that fire experts call the “wildland urban interface,” the zone between the suburbs and mostly unoccupied land.
Given the serious potential for fire in the months ahead, Field advises homeowners to prepare now to defend their homes against any wildfires that do develop and to protect their families from wildfire smoke.
How to prepare for wildfires
It’s important to take steps in advance of a potential increase in wildfire activity to protect your home and the health of people who live there, Field said.
Wildfires have many economic, ecological and health impacts, but among the most important are the consequences of the smoke that can be transported over long distances, he said. “It’s important for that reason to recognize that fire isn’t just a local scale issue when the people who are impacted can be at really great distances,” he said, pointing to the U.S. impacts of major wildfires that have burned in Canada in recent years.
“People should be proactive about recognizing that exposure to even modest amounts of smoke really is a serious health issue, especially for children and the elderly,” he said. He recommends home air filtration systems, even if they’re homemade. “These don’t have to be expensive,” he said, but they can “make a significant improvement in air quality.”
Remain “very attentive to the warnings from the weather services about extreme fire conditions and even if you’re in a low risk area, extreme fire weather is a strong motivation to take precautions,” Field said.
“There’s a very strong association between high wildfire risk and extreme fire weather that’s hot, windy and dry,” he said. “Especially if you’re in a area with significant fire risk, recognizing that it’s during those extreme conditions that you really need to be on top of things.”
It’s also important to work in advance to reduce the vulnerability of your home to wildfire, he said. That includes keeping a 5-foot buffer around your home safe from things that could set the house on fire, he said, including shrubs and vegetation and other flammable materials, whether that’s lawn furniture or children’s toys.
Fire experts advise keeping an area of defensible space up to 30 feet around your home, to reduce the risk of burning, flying embers catching things on fire and to make room for firefighters to defend the space.
Sometimes in urban areas, fire can truly spread from structure to structure, he said, but in many cases, proactive management of the plants and trees growing within 100 feet of the house can make “a huge difference.”
Drought also raises agriculture concerns
In the Plains, outlooks for the next few months are “less than ideal,” Rush said. They’ve had some rain, and may see an early April snowstorm, but there are areas that still desperately need moisture.
“Fires are obviously the biggest concern in the short-term, with the wind expected to pick up again next week. People are on edge here in Nebraska, especially with the tremendous number of acres that burned in March,” Rush said. But the longer-term concern is the ramifications on agriculture.
“Many farmers rely on irrigation to maintain a good crop in dry years,” Rush said. With such a bad year for snowpack, the amount of water available for use in irrigation is likely to be reduced, and given the already high costs, “the financial impact and mental impact of another bad year for crops would be detrimental.”
Article source: Wildfires burn across US as nation fights tinderbox conditions