Ticker for February 15, 2010

                
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February 15, 2010  February 15, 2010  February 15, 2010  February 15, 2010


FIRE Away!

Dr. J.D. Carlson, OK-Fire guru and Agricultural Meteorologist at Oklahoma State
University, forwarded along this great lesson in fire meteorology from this
weekend using the Oklahoma Mesonet and the OK-Fire model. This is a case from
Saturday afternoon (Feb. 13).

To do Dr. Carlon's lesson justice, I'm just going to quote him:

"This one relates to this afternoon's fire danger and the remaining snow cover
across south central and southeast Oklahoma today (see the attached regional
visible image).  The 3 p.m. burning index map (from the Oklahoma Fire Danger
Model) shows BI values suppressed to near zero in these snow covered areas."




"The physical reasons for this can be seen in the 1-h and 10-h dead fuel moisture
maps at 3 p.m. - these represent the moisture contents of fine dead fuels (1-h)
such as grasses and fuels of approx. 1/2 inch diameter (10-h).  Note how their
moisture contents are markedly higher in the snow-covered areas.  This means the
fuels are too wet to be burnable - thus the low BIs."




"Finally the reason the dead fuel moisture is so high can be seen by looking at
the weather map - note the high RHs (also see RH map) in this snow covered area
(and depressed temps) - high RHs lead to high 1-h and 10-h dead fuel moisture."




Great stuff from Dr. Carlson! You can check out the OK-Fire model for yourself
here:

http://okfire.mesonet.org/

Yet another great program using the Oklahoma Mesonet.

Gary McManus
Associate State Climatologist
Oklahoma Climatological Survey
(405) 325-2253
gmcmanus@mesonet.org