The upstream water used to keep Lake Powell afloat is running out “It can change very rapidly in California, and so even though we are starting to think about that as a transition time, we’re still remaining ever-vigilant, and we encourage the public to do the same as well,” Heggie said. ![]() ![]() “Just because the acreage burned has been less than in recent years, the impacts of these fires have actually still been really high.”Īnd while the acres burned are lower than the last five years, Heggie said fire conditions in California can change quickly as the seasons transition. “When people talk about this, they’re often talking about the acreage burned and actually not only does it not tell the whole story, but it arguably doesn’t tell most of what’s important about why we care about wildfires in a societal context,” Swain told CNN. This year’s fires have killed nine people and destroyed more than 800 structures, according to Cal Fire. “While climate change has its fingerprints all over these larger fires, it’s day-to-day weather that drives fire behavior,” he said.ĭaniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California in Los Angeles, noted although less acreage has burned so far this year, individual wildfires have been quite deadly and destructive. California saw one of its worst September heat waves on record earlier this month, which stoked the state’s current active fires, including the Mosquito Fire which has burned more than 76,000 acres and has become the largest in the state so far this year, according to CalFire. Spring brought favorable weather with cooler temperatures and some precipitation, but summer brought hotter and drier weather. Drought conditions are present in 99% of the state, according to the US Drought Monitor conditions scientists say are part of the reason California has seen an uptick in fire activity in recent years.Ĭlements pointed to three things contributing to this year’s below-average fire activity: luck, firefighting strategies and day-to-day weather. Yet California remains in a multiyear megadrought which has drained water supplies and primed the vegetation for landscape-altering wildfires. Heggie called this year’s burned acreage a “dramatic” drop from previous years. In 2021, more than 2.5 million acres had burned through August, while 4.3 million acres had burned in 2020. “If we get those big offshore wind events in Southern California like the Santa Anas, the Diablo winds in Northern California, those could lead to bigger fires,” he said.Īccording to Cal Fire Battalion Chief Jon Heggie, wildfires have burned around 365,000 acres so far this year in California, which is well below the year-to-date acreage burned in recent years. Hot and dry offshore winds, often referred to as the Diablo or Santa Ana winds, can trigger an enormous wildfire threat, and the wind phenomena do not tend to start until the fall and winter. “But we’re not out of the woods yet,” Clements told CNN. ![]() Days later, another blaze threatened the town where she found shelter The Mosquito Fire forced her out of her home. If you would like to obtain information about a CAL FIRE fire burning in your area that is not included on this web site, please contact the CAL FIRE Unit that services your county.Structures burn in the Mosquito Fire burns in Foresthill, California, U.S., September 13, 2022. However, the majority of those fires are contained quickly and no information will generally be provided on these incidents at this site if the fire burns less than 10 acres. Fires occur throughout the State within CAL FIRE jurisdiction on a daily basis during fire season. If you live in a wildland area always have an evacuation plan in place. Please refer to the fire information phone numbers provided on this site, and website links for additional information, and monitor your local radio stations for emergency broadcasts. The sites are not meant to provide up-to-the-minute evacuation or fire behavior information. ![]() Please use the information on these pages only as a reference. As battling a fire, or handling any other disaster is the priority, updates to these sites cannot be guaranteed on a set time schedule. All of our information comes from the firelines and must be approved by the Incident Commander in charge of managing the incident prior to release. This site provides general information concerning an incident. We make every effort to provide accurate and complete information, however the data is subject to review and change. Information presented on the departments website is a representation of the existing wildfire situation, based on the information readily available to CAL FIRE.
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