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Experts Try To Predict Area Of Next Wildfire

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Jul 22, 2008 9:01 pm US/Mountain

Experts Try To Predict Area Of Next Wildfire

Reporting
Alan Gionet
GOLDEN, Colo. (CBS4) ― Adams, Boulder and Douglas counties hope to minimize the risk of wildfires by banning open burning as of Tuesday. Many mountain communities already have burn bans in place.

Right now the Rocky Mountain area is at preparedness Level 2. It means the fire danger is high to extreme. Level 5 is the level where there are major fires exhausting resources. The trick is to move the limited firefighting resources where they're needed before a fire.

The aircraft move in dumping tons of fire retardant. The firefighters push in on the ground. It all comes with coordination and planning. Jim Fletcher is in charge of a five-state area at the Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center. On Tuesday they were moving things away from the Oxyoke Fire near Deckers.

"We're moving some of our heavier resources over to the Housetop Fire, which is the one over near Parachute there and working that," Fletcher said.

It's a game of predictions. Experts on the behavior of fires, like the massive Hayman Fire of 2002, combine minds with weather experts. Over the weekend they got it right before the Oxyoke Fire started. Aircraft moved in within 30 to 60 minutes.

"We had an indication that things could possibly heat up this weekend, so we were ready to pull them in if needed," Fletcher said.

Meteorologist Tim Mathewson says there's still decent moisture up high, but he sees potential trouble ahead.

"These storms have been reluctant to move off the higher terrain into the lower elevations, so that's where we're seeing the main starts and the greatest large fire risk is below 8,500 feet," Mathewson said.

That's part of why it hit at Oxyoke, which is only hundreds of yards from the Hayman burn area.

So far Colorado is having what they call an average year with 650 fires. The nightmare fire is one in the forests killed by pine beetles. Fletcher says he thinks those fires might burn deeper and hotter and be very hard to put out.

(© MMX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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