County

El Niño not helping West’s fire situation

It appears that lightning started the LTE Four-Mile Fire on July 5, located about 8 miles south and east of Rangely. As of Tuesday morning, the U.S. Forest Service reported that the fire had burned 415 acres of brush and was 100 percent contained.
It appears that lightning started the LTE Four-Mile Fire on July 5, located about 8 miles south and east of Rangely. As of Tuesday morning, the U.S. Forest Service reported that the fire had burned 415 acres of brush and was 100 percent contained.

RBC I On May 1, a devastating blaze erupted near Fort McMurray in eastern Alberta, Canada. By late May, it had engulfed more than 1.2 million acres of boreal forest—nearly double the size of Rhode Island. At the height of the fire, which was still burning at press time, more than 80,000 people were evacuated and almost 4,000 employees of Alberta’s tar-sands oil region were unable to work.

The Alberta blaze may well portend a tough fire season in parts of the West. The wildfire season is changing. Blazes are much hotter and larger than they used to be, and seasons are beginning earlier and lasting longer. The characteristics of the Fort McMurray Fire fit the trend of the mega-fires likely to hit the West as the climate warms, says Yong Liu, researcher and head of the Atmospheric Science Team of the U.S. Forest Service.
This winter’s Super El Niño has complicated the outlook
While the Pacific Ocean’s warming waters were expected to bring big storms to the southern half of the West, climatologists say the results disappointed much of the area. That left New Mexico, Arizona, central California and much of Nevada and Utah parched, exacerbating drought conditions, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC), in Boise, Idaho.
In states bypassed by the strong El Niño, the groundwork has been laid for an intense fire season, says Wally Covington, climatologist and fire expert from Northern Arizona University.
Meager snowpack, dry soils and warmer temperatures will make it easier for blazes to spark and spread.
According to NIFC’s May outlook, California’s near-normal snowpack (the best since 2011) has depleted rapidly, and the wildfire season is expected to be worse than usual this year, thanks to high fuel loads. Statewide, the ongoing drought has left huge stocks of desiccated timber, while in the state’s southern region, just enough El Niño precipitation fell to encourage prolific grass growth.
That’s “both a blessing and a curse,” says Daniel Berlant, spokesman for Cal Fire. The El Niño-encouraged fuel loading has forced his agency to prepare for an earlier fire season, but “the extra rain earlier in the year has also allowed us to do prescribed burns earlier.”
Elsewhere in the West, NIFC projections show an earlier-than-normal peak for wildfire danger in New Mexico and Arizona, in May and June. But come July and August, above-average temperatures and rapidly drying fuels will bring a higher fire risk to California, Nevada and southern Idaho. The Rocky Mountain region—Colorado, Wyoming and Montana—is in relatively good shape because of deep snowpack and increased precipitation from late April through May. The Pacific Northwest should also dodge an early fire season, despite a diminished snowpack, thanks to May’s wet and cool weather.
“Super El Niños” like this one, followed by longer periods of warm La Niña conditions, are just one symptom of the larger climate shifts that many climatologists expect the arid West to see.
El Niño is now transitioning to La Niña as the Pacific cools. Typically, those patterns balance each other out. But since this year’s El Niño bypassed areas expected to receive more precipitation, La Niña , which usually brings less precipitation to the region, is likely to cause the dry Southwest to become even drier.
“Once La Niña is firmly in place, we would expect to see more fires in the southern half of the Western U.S. through the fall,” Covington says. “The Southwest is not in a good position.”

Paige Blankenbuehler is a High Country News editorial fellow.

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  • The Barone Middle School track team competed and placed well in the meet in West Grand last weekend. The eighth grade boys won the overall meet. Read the recap online at ht1885.com.
  • The Meeker Preschool Roundup will be held this Friday, April 26th from 8am to 4pm!
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  • The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Rio Blanco Fire Protection District (RBFPD) will begin work on a firebreak northwest of the Town of Meeker this month. Read about it online at ht1885.com.
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The Barone Middle School track team competed and placed well in the meet in West Grand last weekend. The eighth grade boys won the overall meet. Read the recap online at ht1885.com.
The Barone Middle School track team competed and placed well in the meet in West Grand last weekend. The eighth grade boys won the overall meet. Read the recap online at ht1885.com.
1 day ago
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1/9
1 day ago
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2/9
The Meeker Preschool Roundup will be held this Friday, April 26th from 8am to 4pm!
The Meeker Preschool Roundup will be held this Friday, April 26th from 8am to 4pm!
2 days ago
View on Instagram |
3/9
Gear up for an unforgettable adventure with the 2024 Ride The Rockies Route, set to unfold from June 9th to 15th! Read all about this new and exciting adventure visiting Meeker this year in this week’s edition and online at ht1885.com.
Gear up for an unforgettable adventure with the 2024 Ride The Rockies Route, set to unfold from June 9th to 15th! Read all about this new and exciting adventure visiting Meeker this year in this week’s edition and online at ht1885.com.
2 days ago
View on Instagram |
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Rangely Panther Kobey Chism (#22) has been selected to play in the 2024 8-man football all-state game. He’s sponsored by the Bleed Green Lancaster #17 Foundation. Story at ht1885.com.
Rangely Panther Kobey Chism (#22) has been selected to play in the 2024 8-man football all-state game. He’s sponsored by the Bleed Green Lancaster #17 Foundation. Story at ht1885.com.
2 days ago
View on Instagram |
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The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Rio Blanco Fire Protection District (RBFPD) will begin work on a firebreak northwest of the Town of Meeker this month. Read about it online at ht1885.com.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Rio Blanco Fire Protection District (RBFPD) will begin work on a firebreak northwest of the Town of Meeker this month. Read about it online at ht1885.com.
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You can always find a reason to laugh... start with yourself. Hear from our Editor in her column this week online at ht1885.com.
You can always find a reason to laugh... start with yourself. Hear from our Editor in her column this week online at ht1885.com.
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View on Instagram |
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The amount of money reported lost to fraud and scams in the United States nearly tripled from $3.5 billion in 2020 to $10 billion in 2023, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Learn the tricks to help protect yourself and your family in this week’s edition and online at ht1885.com.
The amount of money reported lost to fraud and scams in the United States nearly tripled from $3.5 billion in 2020 to $10 billion in 2023, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Learn the tricks to help protect yourself and your family in this week’s edition and online at ht1885.com.
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About 80 Meeker Elementary Students participated in the reading competition. Prizes were distributed according to the most minutes read by each student.  Story at ht1885.com.
About 80 Meeker Elementary Students participated in the reading competition. Prizes were distributed according to the most minutes read by each student. Story at ht1885.com.
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