High winds do more than spread fires — they keep firefighting aircraft on the ground

Aerial support during the California wildfires has been grounded at times by high winds. Here's what the aircrafts do and why they can't fly in certain conditions.

Fires are moving much faster now. Here’s how to prepare.

In short, we need to prepare. By the time a fast fire ignites, it is too late. To support firefighters and protect our communities, we need to be ready long before fire comes.

Could more controlled burns have stopped the L.A. fires?They can be an effective wildfire prevention tool — but not always.

Once the fires stop burning in Los Angeles and the city picks itself up from the rubble, the chorus of voices asking how such a disaster could have been prevented will rise. In California, the answer to that desperate query is so often “better forestry management practices,” and in particular “more controlled burns.” But that’s not always the full story, and in the case of the historically destructive L.A. fires, many experts doubt that prescribed burns and better vegetation management would have mattered much at all.

This Week’s Unholy Mix of Drought, Wind, and Fire in Southern California: A Warning of an Accelerating Insurance Crisis in Climate-Risk Areas?

In the not-too-distant future, certain areas will effectively be red-lined from a flood or fire insurance perspective, either formally or by having policies be so expensive as to be unaffordable, or having terms that limit coverage in the event of wildfire or flood losses? What happens to those properties when the only market is cash-only buyers (or much smaller mortgages, limited to the maximum that insurers will cover), and then ones who understand that they are at risk of bearing the full or large losses?

And consider: what happens to current home borrowers if they can’t meet the obligations in their mortgage to maintain adequate home insurance?

Hollywood Hills fire breaks out as deadly wildfires burn out of control across Los Angeles area

The Sunset Fire was burning near the Hollywood Bowl and about a mile (kilometer) from the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

The streets around Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and Madame Tussauds were packed with stop-and-go traffic as sirens blared and low-flying helicopters soared by on their way to dump water on the flames. People toting suitcases left hotels on foot, while some onlookers walked towards the flames, recording the fire on their phones.

Officials report ‘0% containment’ for 6 fires across Los Angeles

Multiple wildfires are ripping through parts of the Los Angeles, California, area, scorching thousands of acres. NewsNation's Chris Cuomo unpacks why none of them have been contained.

5 dead, more than 1,100 structures destroyed as firestorm besieges L.A. County

More than 1,100 buildings have burned and at least five people are dead in wildfires burning across L.A. County, making this one of the most destructive firestorms to hit the region in memory.

Malibu residents flee as wildfire swallows homes along iconic Southern California coastline

The beaches are empty in Malibu as a wildfire tears through swaths of the iconic Southern California coastline, consuming homes and vehicles and forcing residents – including legendary actor Dick Van Dyke – to flee their coveted hillside properties.

Experiencing natural disasters increases partisan disagreement on climate change

Mike here: individuals often cling to pre-existing beliefs on politicized topics like climate change, even in the face of contradicting evidence. This phenomenon, well-documented in social psychology, shows that people frequently double down on their beliefs rather than reconsider them. For example, a study involving supporters of the false WMD claims in Iraq revealed that even after being shown evidence to the contrary, including President Bush's admission, their conviction in the validity of those claims increased. Interestingly, some who have experienced climate-related disasters may also deepen their denial, influenced by partisan media that supports their views.

It’s time to redefine what a megafire is in the climate change era

“The modern era of megafires is often defined based on wildfire size,” wrote Jennifer Balch, associate professor of geography at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and her colleagues in the new study, “but it should be defined based on how fast fires grow and their consequent societal impacts.” While large fires have a major effect on air quality, ecosystems, and the release of planet-warming carbon, it is fast fires that have the greatest impact on infrastructure damage, evacuation efforts and, ultimately, death tolls.

Wildfires in the West Aren’t Just Getting Bigger. They’re Faster, Too.

When it comes to wildfire threats, “we’ve been so focused on size,” said Jennifer Balch, the study’s lead author and an associate professor of geography at the University of Colorado Boulder. “But what we really need to focus on is speed.”

Many of today’s deadliest fires burn so ferociously that firefighters cannot do much in the moment but get out of the way, Dr. Coop said. “If we’re not prepared for them, they hit us and they hit us hard.”

Forest Service halts prescribed burns in California. Is it worth the risk?

“They’re backed into a corner, but they’ve backed themselves into a corner,” Quinn-Davidson said. “They’re not leading, and it seems like they’re not capable of leading on prescribed fire, given the nature of politics and how they do business — always choosing short-term risk over long-term vision and strategy.”

She calls for a rethinking of how prescribed burns can be applied on federal lands.

“If the Forest Service is consistently not able to do the work, how can we lean on local resources — tribes and prescribed burn associations, for example — to get that work done?”

This data shows just how much faster California wildfires are getting — and why that's so dangerous

Fires are moving quicker in California versus other regions in the West, the scientists found. Between 2001 and 2020, wildfire growth rates increased by 249% across the Western U.S. — defined as a group of 11 Western states — but 398% in California alone. Mountainous regions of Southern California were found to have the largest increase in daily wildfire growth rates in the two decade span.

“This is the California foothills,” Kolden said. “The Coast Range, the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, all through the Central Valley. This is the region where you really have fires being carried by that grass understory.”

Sharp divide in Oregon over bill to step up logging to prevent wildfires

Republicans are backing a proposal to scale back environmental regulations to “thin” forests while Democrats and environmentalists want to fund community preparedness

We are running out of firefighters at a perilous time

In the era of climate change and forest mismanagement, it’s tempting to shrug one’s shoulders and presume that firefighter shortages are inevitable. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Unlike urban firefighters, wildland firefighters are specially trained to take on the wildfires that plague the West. For years, those employed by the federal government have complained about profound levels of attrition driven by poor pay, increasingly exhausting working conditions and a lack of mental-health support. And unless Congress gets it together, a government shutdown on Oct. 1 will cut their wages across the board.

Extreme heat means more wildfires. It’s taking a toll on firefighters.

Extreme heat increases the chances that firefighters can suffer heat exhaustion or heat stroke — which can be deadly.

And as wildland firefighters face longer seasons, they may also face additional health risks down the line.

‘Weather whiplash’ helped drive this year’s California wildfires

“Fire just is. Fire is inevitable,” said Bloemers. “The problem is the vulnerability of the communities that we’ve built in the fire plain, not the fire, because we aren’t going to eliminate the fire from a Western fire-prone, fire-adapted landscape. It is a natural reality.”

A study Bloemers co-authored emphasizes improving resilience in at-risk communities. Modifying structures and landscaping around communities can make them less likely to burn in a wildfire, and can reduce the potential for ignitions in conditions in which a fire could be difficult to control. 

Oregon House Republicans target forests for wildfire reform as grass and shrubland burns

About 1,650 wildfires this season have burned a record of more than 1.5 million acres in Oregon. But about 75% were not in forests but across grass and shrubland in eastern Oregon, according to the Wildland Mapping Institute. 

“It’s true that better forest management is one piece of the puzzle. At the same time, it’s vital to base wildfire strategies on careful thinking and good science. Broad-brushed claims that more commercial logging will reduce our risk don’t clear that bar,” Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, and chair of the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Wildfire, said. 

The wildfire risk in America’s front yards

A 10-year plan from the Forest Service calls for removing much more of this combustible kindling, reducing flammable fuels on up to 50 million acres of land. But communities will continue burning if leaders don’t also find the money and political will to retrofit older homes, and rethink where and with what new homes are built. “We assume that we can place our house in an area of high risk, and that firefighters will come in and risk their own life to protect our home,” Barrett said. “You would never assume that level of home protection from any other hazard, particularly from earthquakes or floods or hurricanes.”

The electric grid is a wildfire hazard. It doesn’t have to be.

Shareholder pressure on electric utilities has prioritized profits over maintenance that can help reduce wildfire risk. This deferred maintenance over the decades means old frail utility poles are more likely to fall and outdated, weakened wires are more apt to snap during storms.