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General Weather/Earth Sciences Topics => Weather Conditions Discussion => Topic started by: Scalphunter on June 15, 2015, 11:33:03 AM
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Here in Alaska fire season is considered our summer severe weather. High winds and low humidity make the right conditions. This fire grew to it size in less then 24 hours.
http://m.ktuu.com/news/fire-crews-responding-to-wildfire-near-parks-highway/33576142
Hot shots from lower 48 are being sent. The black spruce stands are like 5 gal. Of gasoline in each tree. Very resinious.
John
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Governor has declared this fire as an disaster area. Fire fighters are trying to keep it out of the Willow business area. Fire heading south to reads Houston. Zero containment.
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I feel for those residents in the area and their losses. Over 6500 acres in less than 1 day is incredible to see.
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I saw the fire on the news this morning. I hope everyone is ok.
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So far no loss of human life. According to the News-Miner the fire has grown to 8500 acres. Temperatures in the 80's with humidity as low as 15% are forecasted. Over 2/3 of the sstate's under fire watch or red flag warning.
John
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Another new fire to the south of this one down on the Kenai Peninsula in Sterling. From 640 acres it has grown to 1200 acres and evacuation are being ordered. Hope this is not going to be another 2004. That was bad fire year.
John
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With most of the state under a read flag warning, it sure doesn't look good. I'm sure we will be getting the warnings too when the temps start going back up.
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There now 50 fires burning across Alaska. 16 new starts overnight. Several in the area of the Willow fire started by dry thunder storms coming off Talkeetna mountains. Near Dot Lake an small village on the Alcan 100 firefighters are trying to keep an burn from jumping the Tanana and threaten the highway and the village. Fire officials are stressing to watch h outdoor activity as they are running out of fire teams. As one put it " there are lot of parties going on". Largest fire is in remote federal land and it is unmanned and will be allowed to just burn itself out. The nation #1 fire at the moment is the Sockeye fire near Willow. It is now under type 1 incident command.
Several towns and boroughs have banned fireworks and the sale of fireworks due to the extreme condition.
Lot of streams are low or have dried up due to b the lack of snow from last winter.
John
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Not to dis on CA, but it seems like that's where the news focus always seems to be. I don't hear much about Alaska fires on the national news.
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Hate to hear that John. As Greg alluded to, we just don't see news about that kind of thing in the continental areas anymore (At least on my world news). If it's not something that people can't sensationalize, it's not on the news anymore.
I hope you all get some much needed rain soon John.
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I know what you all mean, if it ain't happening in the lower 48, who cares? Even when they (TWC and others) talk about the drought in CA, they only mention Los Angeles like it's only happening there and not any other part of state. What's up with that?
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Weather only happens where lots of people live :!:
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Yes I know what you guys mean. Stuff happens here but it like we are an foreign country to the new media . As of this afternoon all logging operation were suspended till further notice due to high temps and low humidity. Starting to get smoke here from the Healy lake fire 40 miles so of us.
Will try keep all upto date as stuff changes.
Yes Harry when your temps go up I am sure the red stuff will come too. Our fire crew general go south to assist in late August or so.
Anyway everyone stay safe out there.
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Anyway everyone stay safe out there.
Same to you! I hope everyone makes it through ok.
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Thanks, John and the same for you. Currently, there are about 9 fires going on in CA. They are talking about a high fire danger threat in So Cal because of the Excessive Heat Warnings.
Anyone wanting the current status of the fire situation nationwide, here is a good resource that also includes Alaska.
http://yubanet.com/fire.php
Also, there is my web page I created that shows where all the current fire watches and warnings are and I also added a few maps. A couple of them are Google Crisis Maps using the InciWeb overlay that shows all the current active fires and just so John doesn't feel left out, I also included Alaska. :-)
It's a little slow to load at times because the parser is going through all 50 states and territories.
http://ucweather.org/firewx.php
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Here's a link to the Incoweb page. They have some really great coverage of most major fires.
- http://inciweb.nwcg.gov/ (http://inciweb.nwcg.gov/)
Most of the State of Nevada is under a fire weather watch for this weekend. Our humidity here in the northern part of Nevada has been in the single digits. We had a low humidity reading today of 1% this morning at 10:47AM. Temps have been in the 90's here. Even our local Minden-Tahoe airport AWOS is reporting similar humidity readings so my Davis VP2 must be pretty accurate.
Stay safe John!
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38 new fires Friday most of the m were lighting cause. Bolted been going crazy pass two days. It is whooping away as I type this. 2 fires that normally be fought have been placed in monitor status. They are as the forestry divisions "out of resources". All available man power is out in the field. 1 crew was moved from Dot Lake to Northway which is new burn. Nws says this heat wave here will continue into this fall. Hurry up September.
State fire Marshall has banned all open fires including charcoal BBQ'S.
Gas outside broilers are ok. No 1 priority fire now is the Card Street fire down on the Kenai. The Sockeye fire is at5% containment. Last count 25 homes destroyed and 50 or so out buildings. Been setting up deluge sprinkler here just incase.
John
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They finally said something about it on the national news last night. 'bout time!
Today is the summer solstice, the longest day. Hopefully it gets better from here, John. At least you have plenty of daylight to get your to-do list worked on today! :)
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Lol. Yes about 22 hours and 45 minutes worth. Basically tonight without any lights. Out of state player get an little upset at times about no lights. It be like this till Aug. Mid Aug.
Yesterday day was an very active day lighting wise. I recorded 853 strikes on the Boldtek. Not sure what BLU came up wit
h. About sunrise this morning I recorded last strike from those storms. Since 1000 hr this morning recorded another 160 strikes. One thing it did was cool some of the heat down and did get small bit of rain. So far today humidity been up.
Will pass on more as we learn about it
John
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More then 100 new fire sprung up Saturday. Not all where from lighting either. Despite the banning of all open fires people continue to disobey and soon have fire scenario out of control as the Rex Complex fire yesterday. Over 100 acres and treating homes in the area. We had some idiot set a fire at age of an tree over on the Salcha River and then left. Quick response from the local volunteers knocked down before it got going. That fire was 2 miles away from us. Bad enough we have mother nature to contend with but also the we don't care crowd or those who do react responsive to what happening around them.
NWS says more of the same this week. High temps in the 80's to low 90's and low humidity.
At the moment largest fire in state is at 2900 acres and growing. It is on federal land and feds opt to let it burn. It is unmanned except for 6 guys protecting several recreation cabin in the preserve.
John
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http://m.ktuu.com/news/nulato-baker-creek-being-evacuated-due-to-nearby-wildfires/33729244
Nola to fire was unmanned except for local villagers due to lack of man power and resources to send up there along the river.
I posted the article as it cover most of the fires and has links to other related items for those who are interested and following the thread.
John
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There were more than 31,000 lightning strikes in Alaska from June 19 to June 21, and that is also the cause of nearby North Fork Fire No. 457, which had burned 971 acres by Monday evening.
That is a lot of activity in 2 days time. My Boltek sounds off almost constantly.
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I just saw this and thought I'd post it.
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Well so the total acreage burnt here stands at 1 million acres or 1562 square miles. Some rain suppose to fall in parts of Alaska. Raining here but have yet to get an tip. Biggest problem from the smoke in the rain . Lot of ash in it and makes an mess.
John
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...wow..... :shock:
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As of today there are over 600 wildfires burning across Alaska. 1.8 million acres of tundra and forest has burned. Several vi)ages hav= evacuated the elders and children. Some by boat as smoke was too bad to do air evac.
http://firewx.arh.noaa.gov/brief.php
NWS has special page up for alaska fires.
Today's forecast mid 80's for our area.
Fireworks ban still in effect. The Sockeye fire that I first reported here is looking like fireworks was the source of ingition. In Alaska if you start and wildfire you can face jail time a ND also rein burst the cost of the operation.
John