After widespread dry lightning, which brought along loads of new starts and caused existing fires to come back from the dead like Lazarus, the National Preparedness Level has increased to a PL5. Numerous Teams were dispatched yesterday across the Nation, including a Team from the NY Fire Department.
On top of that, the Pacific Northwest also bumped their region back to a PL5.
Most Hotshot crews broke 1,100 hours of overtime last month, and some crews from the Southwest have already started shutting down. Yes… that’s 1,100 hours of overtime in five months. I got a message from a Hotshot in the Great Basin yesterday saying they might hit 1,500 hours of overtime in September… “My body is broke, but I got truck money.”
Fires on the Bitterroot National Forest in Montana started showing signs of life again. The Grouse, Daly, and Johnson fires… it’s looking like they might end up complexing all of those. Others in Washington and Oregon popped back up with Red Flag conditions yesterday, including the Ruby Fire in the North Cascades National Park and the 208 Fire on the Willamette Complex.
Huge grass fires burned across eastern Oregon in the last 72 hours; the Wiley Flat Fire near Prineville ripped 83,000 acres. Even Arizona is bringing in Teams to manage the fires they still have going down there. There are 67 large fires currently being fully suppressed in the U.S., and according to the National Interagency Fire Center, a total of 1,981,105 acres have burned so far in 2024. There are still 25 CIMTS, three Type 1 Incident Management Teams, 451 crews, 1,012 engines, and 120 helicopters working wildfires nationwide.
Fire season is far from over.
Idaho continues to be the national priority, and the rest of the Great Basin predicts fire weather through the weekend.
The Wapiti Fire in Idaho is now 113,000 acres and growing, with nearly 1,600 personnel attached to that incident. On top of that, they are dealing with countless new starts that have tapped out the already stretched-thin initial attack resources. They are running around like Sage Grouse with their heads chopped off.
Wyoming has been very busy with large grass and timber fires, a few over 100,000 acres. They even had a Coal Silo fire that transitioned into a wildfire and had resources scrambling all night with the winds making things complicated.
And with all of that… California may just be getting started. Heat advisories are starting to pop up, Santa Ana winds are predicted soon, and Red Flag conditions are back. Once the Northern Rockies, Great Basin, and Pacific Northwest finally settle down like an aging couple, we might just move everyone over to Southern California. And don’t forget the East Coast Fall season is about to begin.
All very interesting things to consider as the Forest Service is looking to shut down seasonal employees on Oct. 1st, and threats of a government shutdown loom. But we’ve heard that all before…
My main question is, if the need for resources is still so great, why are there well over a dozen SEATS available and contracted in Idaho and the PNW that have been sitting on the tarmac for weeks? That might be a question for the Bureau of Land Management and Office of Aviation Services. But aviation companies and pilots are scratching their collective heads.
Snaptember is here to stay, and a PL5 deep into the month was probably not on a lot of folk’s bingo cards. It looks like it’ll be a busy month and maybe a busy October as well.
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🤔Will USFS go through with the layoffs on Oct 1st? 3 wks away? I betcha they’ll find a way to extend seasonal strength of force until Oct 31st at least
Who is the "Hotshot" speaker with substack?