Originally Posted by Shodd
Originally Posted by Fireball2
If it's a dry spring firefighting agencies scream about forest fuel moisture content being lower than normal and it's going to be a hell of a fire season. Be very scared and rely on them to protect us.

If it's a wet spring they scream about increased understory and flash fuel loads higher than normal and it's going to be a hell of a fire season. Be very scared and rely on them to protect us.

If it's a "normal", boring year, fire danger is high due to it normally being that way in summer, you know. Be scared and all that.

Seeing a pattern?



Fireball, I've been fighting fire for over 20 years and lately in the last 4 years we've been seeing a trend that scares the hell out of us. Fires are covering twice as much ground in a given time period than has ever been recorded. This is something new and this type of fire behavior is something weve never encountered before.

Frankly it is something your going to want to pay pretty close attention to if you are one of those folks that lives in a fire prone area. With the right year and conditions I believe we are all going to see it lit up on a scale that dwarfs anything we've seen in our lifetime.

Shod


Living in the same town as Fireball, we had the Biscuit Fire of 2003 or 04... that fire burned an area larger than the state of Connecticut... but the reason for the size of that fire was access... under the Clinton Administration and spearheaded by Cousin Al Gore... they had closed and let 'return to nature' a bunch of forest service roads... to "Wilderness" once again...

We had severe smoke to live thru around here for 6 weeks on that one... came thru an area burning last July coming back from New Mexico... smoke was so thick, it was almost as dark as night out at 4 in the afternoon, when I was coming down Highway 140 from Klamath Falls to Medford....