The Clockworks

UPDATE: June 25, 2008, 10:03 pm

Based on information from Google’s excellent map resources, I can confirm at least 174,468 acres have been burned as of two hours ago, with several of the larger fires still at 0-10% containment. It is a little odd that the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is only reporting a total acreage burned of 104,821… I’ll keep an eye on official versus independent reports concerning this. Each pin on the map represent a major fire.

Interested in how fires in California can effect people NOT actually in California? Sign On San Diego reports that in Reno, Nevada they have issued a Stage One Alert due to the unhealthy air from the fires, with visibility reduced to as low as three miles. It is also suggested Las Vegas could be covered in thick haze, but the effect on air quality would be negligible. Credit to the Associated Press as well.

June 25, 2008, 1:09 am (Original Post)

It took less than twenty-four hours for an electrical storm to let loose eight-thousand lightning strikes, starting more than 800 wildfires across Northern California. Check out the AP report, with contributions by Alicia Chang.

“You’re looking at a pattern that’s climatological rare. We typically don’t see this happen at this time of summer, to see 8,000, that’s way up there on the scale.” – John Juskie, Science Officer with the National Weather Service in Sacramento

One problem is that the storm brought lots of lightning, but the rain that came along “evaporated in hot, dry

layers of the atmosphere before it hit the ground,” said Juskie. Is there a connection between a storm like this and Global Warming? Let us look into that…

On August 31st, 2007, NASA Scientists created a new climate model (article is from Science Daily), the indications were that violent severe storms and tornadoes may become a more common occurence as the climate warms. Lighting produced in storms often ignites

wildfires in dry or drought stricken areas. Findings lead researchers to predict that some regions (California?) would have less humidity in the air, and be more prone to wildfires as a result. It makes sense to think that with drier conditions, there will be fewer storms… but is that a good thing?

“These findings may seem to imply that fewer storms in the future will be good news for disastrous western U.S. wildfires, But drier conditions near the ground combined with higher lightning flash rates per storm may end up intensifying wildfire damage instead.” – Tony Del Genio, lead author of the study and a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York.