The winter grassland fire that broke out along Colorado’s Front Range was rare, experts say, but similar events will be more common in the coming years as climate change warms the planet, sucking moisture out of plants. , suburbs grow in fire-prone areas and people continue to set off destructive flames.
“These fires are different from most of the fires that we have been seeing in the West in that they are grass fires and occur in the winter,” said Jonathan Overpeck, professor in the School of Environment and Sustainability at the University. from Michigan. “Ultimately, things will continue to get worse unless we stop climate change.”
Flames hit drought-stricken turf fields and northwest Denver neighborhoods Thursday at alarming speed, propelled by guests as high as 105 mph (169 kph). Tens of thousands of people were ordered to flee without warning.
“I left Whole Foods, which is half a mile from ground zero, and felt like I had to jump in my car and do a race for my life as nearby smoke, wind, and flames engulfed the area,” Susie Pringle of Lafayette said in an email. “It was frightening!”
Two people were missing as of Sunday and at least seven were injured. Authorities estimated that nearly 1,000 houses and other buildings were destroyed..
The fire burned at least 24 square kilometers. The cause is still under investigation, but experts say it is clear what allowed it to spread so quickly.
“With the snow on the ground, this would not have happened at all the way it did,” said Keith Musselman, a snow hydrologist in Boulder. “It was really the grass and the dry landscape that allowed this fire to jump long distances in a short period of time.”
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It took three ingredients to start this fire: fuels, a warm climate and an ignition source, said Jennifer Balch, a fire scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder. “And then you add a fourth ingredient, the wind, and that’s when it became a disaster.”
Temperatures in Colorado between June and December were the warmest on record, Balch said. The grasses became thick because they had a wet spring, but saw no moisture until flurries of snow came on Friday night.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis on Sunday called the blaze a “terrible convergence” of destructive wind gusts that hit the area after the unusually dry and warm winter.
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“We know that with the climate we face greater risks,” said Polis. “Right here in the city and the suburbs.”
Balch said Colorado is a dry landscape filled with flammable material for much of the year, “and those time periods are getting longer with climate change.”
The lesson learned throughout this event is that “the urban-forest interface is much larger than we thought,” said Balch. That means a larger area is under threat from wildfires.
That border area, where human-built structures meet fire-prone undeveloped wilderness, has always been the foothills, he said. Boulder firefighters consider the West Broadway interface: a busy street that runs through the center of the city. But Thursday’s fire broke out east of that line, along with thousands of homes that have sprung up on the east side of the Rocky Mountains since the 1990s, Balch said.
“There were stretches between Denver and Fort Collins that had no development, but now it’s like a long track of continuous development,” said Balch. “And those houses are built with materials that are very flammable: wood siding, asphalt roofs.
“We need to completely rethink how we are building houses.”
The other major change is understanding how these fires start in the first place, he said.
“There is no natural source of ignition at this time of year. There is no lightning, ”he said. “Either it will be related to infrastructure or it will be man-made.”
“The way we live in the landscape and our daily activities make us vulnerable,” he said.
Over the past two decades, 97% of wildfires were started by people, according to a recent report. study by the Cooperative Institute for Environmental Science Research at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Causes have ranged from construction site accidents to a car with a hot exhaust and thrown cigarettes.
“I like to say that we need Smokey Bear in the suburbs,” he said. “We need to think about how our daily activities can contribute to the ignitions or sparks that start wildfires.”
Unless people stop climate change by reducing fossil fuels, wildfires will threaten communities, Overpeck said.
“I have no doubt that the conditions that lead to really serious wildfires, whether it’s on the grass or in the woods, are only going to get worse,” he said.
As more people move to areas where wildfires occur, the threat increases.
“We’re building towns and cities and infrastructure, so it’s only a matter of time before we have entire towns on fire like in California and events like this one in Colorado.”
Associated Press reporter Brittany Peterson contributed to this report.
Reference-www.nationalobserver.com