TEXAS FIRES
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No such thing as a 'good' wildfire....
...but this is a bad one. Would it make sense for the states/feds to procure a fleet of flying tankers since this is ALWAYS a huge problem? I suppose it would cost money, so it's probably out. I know one thing. It used to be mostly acreage that got burned, but with more populated areas it's now communities.
...but this is a bad one. Would it make sense for the states/feds to procure a fleet of flying tankers since this is ALWAYS a huge problem? I suppose it would cost money, so it's probably out. I know one thing. It used to be mostly acreage that got burned, but with more populated areas it's now communities.
The news said 80% of the cattle in Texas is in that area.
jcs266
Member
What a nightmare. Prayers and thoughts to all those effected. I feel so bad for the livestock also. A terrible loss and waste.
I grew up in that area and even if I have no family left in the panhandle it kind of hits home. I worked for my Uncle on his ranch and he had some 75000 acres of farm and pasture land. Sure hate to see any of it burn.
LVSteve
Member
I read the news reports and started looking up where these towns are located. On a map it became apparent that the amount of land burned is huge. Some of the locations were 20 miles or more apart.
Maui was drought, wind, non-native grasses, and a fire started from a power line.
And a poor/delayed response to the fire, from what I've read...
My extended family lives in the Panhandle - Amarillo, Canadian, Pampa, Stratford, and Dalhart.
In Canadian, folks were told to evacuate, but couldn't because of the fire blocking the roads in and out. My cousin lost some out buildings. My aunt told me the historic Canadian bridge burned.
Other than that, everybody seems to be OK - I haven't heard anything else.
In Canadian, folks were told to evacuate, but couldn't because of the fire blocking the roads in and out. My cousin lost some out buildings. My aunt told me the historic Canadian bridge burned.
Other than that, everybody seems to be OK - I haven't heard anything else.
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Yep. Bet they were set as punishment.
Over a million acres!
By comparison...
By comparison...
LVSteve
Member
Too busy trying to get it under control, saving lives, and saving property to be worried about how it started at this stage.
LVSteve
Member
The fire was observed by satellite to start at this location.
35.847875°, -101.43265°
Paste that into Google Maps. If you do a street view, there are more potential sources of ignition than I can count, especially given the high winds in the area at the time.
I would post a Google Maps link but apparently that is a no-no, either on this site or theirs.
35.847875°, -101.43265°
Paste that into Google Maps. If you do a street view, there are more potential sources of ignition than I can count, especially given the high winds in the area at the time.
I would post a Google Maps link but apparently that is a no-no, either on this site or theirs.
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A lawsuit has been filed claiming that poor maintenance of utility poles led to one snapping. The suit goes on to say the high winds caused the pole to snap, allowing live lines to hit the ground, starting the fire. Seems plausible to me.
mckenney99
Member
Can someone explain why there does not appear to be any use of air tankers being used? Is their use just not being reported or is there some other logical reason for that not being a viable option?
This is a serious question where I seek education on the use of this resource.
This is a serious question where I seek education on the use of this resource.
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Most of the wildfires making news in Texas are on the High Plains, otherwise know as "the Panhandle" to non-Texans. Virtually the entirety of the High Plains received well above average rainfall last spring and summer; it's not a true desert but there's a lot of 15 inch annual rainfall areas on the High Plains (less than 10 is "true desert in Texas). Some areas around Amarillo got well over 35 inches of rain last year and some areas much more.
Consequently we experienced something similar to California when they have lots of rainfall. We had lots more fuel in the form of dried plant matter than usual. We have wildfires across Central and West Texas every year and the causes are pretty varied. Around here welding fences or wind turbines causes a share as does shredded trailer tires and wheel rims dragging on the road surface. It is not uncommon to incur straight line winds capable of toppling wood power poles.
Biggest losses, so far, seem to be livestock. And, of course, the surviving stock doesn't have much to eat just now so there's a big effort to get hay onto the High Plains to hold them over.
I made the acquaintance of a dryland (no irrigation) farmer near Brownfield, TX 100 or so miles south of Lubbock when making my agronomy rounds years ago. He was exceptionally bright and was making it work with around 12 inches of natural precipitation annually. When I asked how much rain he got, and he told me, I remarked it didn't seem like very much. He agreed but added "But you ought to be here the day it happens."
Consequently we experienced something similar to California when they have lots of rainfall. We had lots more fuel in the form of dried plant matter than usual. We have wildfires across Central and West Texas every year and the causes are pretty varied. Around here welding fences or wind turbines causes a share as does shredded trailer tires and wheel rims dragging on the road surface. It is not uncommon to incur straight line winds capable of toppling wood power poles.
Biggest losses, so far, seem to be livestock. And, of course, the surviving stock doesn't have much to eat just now so there's a big effort to get hay onto the High Plains to hold them over.
I made the acquaintance of a dryland (no irrigation) farmer near Brownfield, TX 100 or so miles south of Lubbock when making my agronomy rounds years ago. He was exceptionally bright and was making it work with around 12 inches of natural precipitation annually. When I asked how much rain he got, and he told me, I remarked it didn't seem like very much. He agreed but added "But you ought to be here the day it happens."
There really isn't any place to get water out there; I mean high volumes in short periods of time. No lakes or surface water to speak of. Thus tankers aren't considered terribly practical due to the distances they'd have to go to get refilled.
Fire retardant apparently doesn't work that well in the kind of wind conditions the High Plains is experiencing and some worry about its effect on stock and range-land rebound. The usual methods rely a lot on cutting firebreaks with dozers but the high winds have made making sufficiently wide firebreaks pretty challenging.
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Not CooL!
Click for full screen.
Click for full screen.
LVSteve
Member
I noticed when driving back from the Dallas area at Christmas that the ground looked pretty dry, despite it having rained a week before. Is that how it works up there. I assume the wet spring and summer resulted in a lot of growth in the Panhandle, giving lots of fuel for a wildfire.
mckenney99
Member
Thank you, I was kind of thinking water sources might be an issue, but not being from the area and living in the land of plenty, it is kind of hard to relate to the total lack of water availability.
There are tankers fighting the fires and they get their water from Lake Meredith located near Fritch and Sanford. I've watched the tankers twice skim the lake and take on water. Quite a sight to see when those planes take on water with their wings just feet above the water. Amazing pilots flying those tankers. For an update on some of the fires burning in the Texas Panhandle, for anyone interested, can look at newschannel10.com out of Amarillo, Texas and they have updates.
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From Central Texas west we receive somewhere between 30 inches of rain, "normally," to 10 or a little less out towards El Paso where some of that geography is considered true desert. There's a reason Texas leads the nation, by far, in wind power generation - it's windy here. Thus our evapo-transpiration rate is very high, we dry out fast, and it's difficult to recharge groundwater to any appreciable depth. Most crops on the High Plains survive in perched water tables coinciding with the crop root zone and in the western half of Texas the soil profile is generally dry below that for a distance.
Here near the geographic center we can get four or five inches of slow rain and be dry as toast in 10 days. But we seldom get gentle slow rain; it kinda almost always blows 70 mph, hails, or floods to mark our rainfall events.
I can offer a bit of info on that. The worst thing for an aircraft is to sit unused. Systems quickly break down. To have a fleet of fire tankers on standby would be a very expensive--non-profitable--venture indeed. Smaller fire bomber that can scoop water from lakes and rivers are one thing, larger airliner-size aircraft requiring ground support are another. Having experience with Buffs and tankers sitting on nuclear alert for 90 days or more, I can say the only reason most of them ever got off the ground after alert status was because of the weekly engine start/taxi exercises they conducted. Considering the small number of large fires that occur, no company would be able to endure the expense needed to support fleets of fire tankers, a very specialized aircraft.
I got off the phone with my aunt in Amarillo. She's from Canadian.
I'm giving third hand info here: Canadian, the city itself, didn't burn but about 40 or so houses did on the outskirts. She's making a trip sometime this week to check on some property. As I said earlier, my cousin lost an outbuilding and one other got scorched pretty bad.
As bad as it was/is at least it wasn't/isn't as bad as it could've been.
I'm giving third hand info here: Canadian, the city itself, didn't burn but about 40 or so houses did on the outskirts. She's making a trip sometime this week to check on some property. As I said earlier, my cousin lost an outbuilding and one other got scorched pretty bad.
As bad as it was/is at least it wasn't/isn't as bad as it could've been.
smoothshooter
Member
Drug/human traffickers? Terrorists? Careless humans?
Ivan the Butcher
Member
The Pine Barrens in New Jersey have National Forest fire protection. For airborne water tankers they use helicopters with big cloth buckets. A construction equipment was fire 1500 feet from my daughter's house, the hydraulic fluid and diesel fuel were beyond the ability of the local FD so they called for air-tanker back up. My S-I-L is a Lt. on a neighboring FD and was on scene, His thought was insurance fraud was the reason for the fire! That happened about two weeks before a trip we made to the kid's house. I was going to make an offer on that very machine! I guess they got impatient!
Ivan
Ivan
jdh
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My wife grew up in Scott's Acres. The family home is gone. The fire that went through the neighborhood destroyed some homes while leaving the one next to it untouched.
Put Scott's Arces in the facebook search box for several drone videos of the aftermath.
Put Scott's Arces in the facebook search box for several drone videos of the aftermath.
