Wildfire

When wildland firefighters are on prescribed fires, they’re breathing the same smoke and facing many of the same hazards found on wildfires, but they don’t get the same hazard pay. That could soon change.

The monthly National Interagency Fire Center outlooks are typically staid documents, providing just-the-facts analysis. But the latest is superlative-laden as it describes record-low snowpacks, record-early snow melt and record-high temperatures.

A new study from Western Colorado University found that winters with low snowpack tend to yield wildfire seasons that destroy more live biomass. The findings don’t bode well for Colorado forests this summer, but the worst outcomes can still be avoided.

Highway 133 was closed at mile marker 63 near Sunfire Ranch due to a wildfire.

The Wildfire Collaborative Roaring Fork Valley has been collecting data in several communities that will help predict how a fire would spread from home to home. That analysis will identify high risk areas, and the most effective mitigation work to slow a wildfire.

The Lee Fire burned over 137,000 acres in Rio Blanco County. The fire burned mostly on federal lands, impacting private landowners that lease it. Local officials are considering how the burned area may impact the local economy and environment.

Yale’s Climate Opinion Maps now include questions asking Americans about specific extreme weather events like wildfires and floods and how they relate to climate change. More than other Mountain West states, Colorado residents link climate change to these severe weather events.

A University of Utah study used data from wildfires in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Northern California to look at how private forests for industrial timber harvest were impacted by severe fire weather, brought about by climate change.

Historically dry fuels and long stretches of fire weather have led to the conditions driving one of Colorado’s biggest wildfires. Some experts are saying that climate change, which creates these conditions, could make these kinds of fire the new normal.

Wildfires throughout the Mountain West have caused significant air quality problems this summer, even for communities miles away from the fires. CU Boulder’s Joost de Gouw says that’s because of how particles in the smoke interact with the atmosphere.