December Update – New interviews and videos.

We’ve been pretty busy in past 6 weeks with interviews, burning, planning work, and some blacksmithing. Here are some of the projects we’ve been working on: An interview with Tim Chavez: I sat down with my friend, Cal Fire’s legendary Tim Chavez to talk about the science of wildfire prediction, and why it is so … Read more

An interview with Wolfy Rougle

We sat down recently with Wolfgang (Wolfy) Rougle to talk about prescribed fire, and efforts she is helping lead to increase local capacity for citizen-led prescribed burning in Butte County, Califorina. The Butte County Prescribed Burn Association has been running for several years, and has helped landowners to safely burn on private property around Forest … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 18, 2022

Things got a little squirrelly yesterday on the east side of the fire, but this morning’s top story is RAIN!     Mosquito Fire – September 18, 2022 Maps & Intel: Ryan Cowper Stephens As we saw on the McKinney fire this year, rain over a wildfire creates new hazards.  An extreme example of this … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 17, 2022

Mop up continues around Foresthill and things are looking good on the northwestern area of the fire leading up to today’s expected wind event. Mop up continuing on the northeast area of the fire along Foresthill, Chicken Hawk and Deadwood Roads. Firing overnight around the Middle Fork of the American River along the Inner Bay … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 16, 2022

Firing operations went well last night and no issues were reported around the fire. Yesterday saw moderate areas of growth on the northern, southwestern and eastern end of the fire. A little dryer and warmer today but more or less similar conditions around the fire as we saw yesterday are expected. Tomorrow we’re expecting big … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 15, 2022

Mosquito Fire – September 15, 2022 Intro & Livestream: Zeke Lunder Maps & Intel: Ryan Cowper Stephens September 15 at 7am – Fire behavior was pretty subdued yesterday under smoke and mild winds. We took a trip out to the north end of the fire and connected with the Division Supervisor working on a strategy … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 14, 2022

September 14 at 7am – Fire made big moves yesterday. Our livestream last night detailed the Mosquito Fire‘s spread toward Foresthill and east, with extended Q&A on forestry, prescribed fire, and how fuel and weather conditions yesterday helped prevent the fire from jumping Foresthill Road.    In the Evening Update, footage from today: We went … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 13, 2022

September 13 at 10am: Forecasted to have less smoke hanging around the fire today. Inversion could lift early and increase fire behavior. Data from last night’s infrared flight was spotty due to heavy smoke and not worth interpretation. Overnight, firing operations were completed between Buckeye Peak to the American River. The fire was most active … Read more

Mosquito & Mountain Fire Intel – 9/12/22

New heat maps for the Mosquito Fire, near Foresthill and Georgetown, California. We also look at the overnight spread of the rekindled Mountain Fire, northwest of Mt. Shasta (no new mapping, just webcam imagery). There was no overnight IR, so we are skipping the Cedar Creek Fire in Oregon this morning.

 

 

Spread Potential of the Mosquito Fire and Other Fire News – September 11, 2022

California and Cedar Creek Wildfires – September 11, 2022 Mountain, Mosquito & Cedar Creek We edited our morning Lookout Livestream and added a section about how far the Mosquito Fire is from Truckee and Tahoe, and landscape conditions that might affect its spread. Also, the video has updated maps of new spread on the Mountain … Read more

Evening Update and Wildfire Q&A – September 10, 2022

Evening Update – Mosquito, Mountain & Cedar Creek Wildfires – September 10, 2022 This video gives an update on fire spread of the fires, above, and has an extended Q&A session with Zeke Lunder answering a wide range of questions on wildland firefighting topics including: Why don’t we fly air tankers in heavy smoke or … Read more

Cedar Creek and California Wildfires – September 10, 2022

California and Cedar Creek Wildfires – September 10, 2022 Mosquito, Fairview, Forward & Cedar Creek Mosquito Fire – 10am Update If you watched our Mosquito Fire livestream this morning (September 10, 2022), the 7:45am IR flight shows the following developments since the 10pm imagery used in our YouTube presentation. Color key: Green dots are structures. … Read more

California Wildfires – September 9, 2022

California Wildfires – September 9, 2022 Mosquito & Fairview Maps and captions: Ryan Cowper Stephens Table of Contents: Mosquito Fire Fairview Fire Mosquito Fire UPDATE 10:30 am FIRIS inferred imagery: MAP KEY: RED perimeter to YELLOW perimeter is about 12 hours fire growth between 11pm last night and 1030 am today. GREEN boxes are structures … Read more

California Wildfires – September 8, 2022

California Wildfires – September 8, 2022 Mosquito, Fork, Radford & Fairview Maps and captions: Ryan Cowper Stephens and Zeke Lunder 9/8/2022 Lookout Livestream Evening Update 9/8/2022 Lookout Livestream Morning Update Table of Contents: Mosquito Fire Fork Fire Radford FIre Fairview Fire Mosquito Fire Maps were updated three times on 9/8/22. UPDATE: 4:45 pm, 9/8/2022 FIRIS … Read more

Mosquito Fire – September 7, 2022

Mosquito Fire – September 7, 2022 Maps and captions: Zeke Lunder and Ryan Stephens The Mosquito Fire started last night in the Middle Fork American River Canyon, at Oxbow Reservoir. It is growing rapidly today and will become a major fire. Under current conditions, firefighting will not control the head of the fire, and the … Read more

Southern California Wildfires – September 7, 2022 Video

From Zeke:

New heat maps for the Mosquito Fire (near Foresthill), Fairview Fire (near Hemet) and Radford Fire (near Big Bear). Also, we look at potential power grid impacts of current fires, and talk about wildfire history, burn severity, and mapping tools we use to analyze fire effects.

 

 

 

 

Cedar Creek, Rum Creek and SoCal Fire Updates – September 6, 2022 Video

New heat maps for the Mountain Fire, near Gazelle. We check in on the stubborn Rum Creek Fire, and take a look at the Cedar Creek Fire, east of Oakridge, Oregon. Also, we duck down to Southern California to look at their new fires, and talk about wildfire severity, and mapping tools we use to analyze fire effects.

 

 

Rum Creek, Mill & Mountain Updates – September 5, 2022 Video

Zeke’s YouTube reporting from this morning, September 5, 2022. Happy Labor Day!

  • New heat maps for the Mountain Fire, near Gazelle
  • We check in on the stubborn Rum Creek Fire
  • …and take a look at the Cedar Creek Fire, east of Oakridge, Oregon

 

 

 

 

Mill, Mountain, Rum Creek and SRF Complex – September 4, 2022 Livestream

Here’s Zeke’s edited live stream from today. He covers the Mill Fire, Mountain Fire and Rum Creek Fire. This is not the original live stream because Zeke had a layer on one of the fire maps that wasn’t supposed to be there. So we took down that live stream and put this fixed version back up. The Mill Fire update is on second video.

Zeke is planning on doing another live fire update around 7am tomorrow morning, September 5, 2022. Go to our YouTube channel and subscribe to catch it. Also, follow Zeke on Twitter, he usually puts some updated maps up in the afternoon if any of the fires have made any big changes.

 

 

Mill Fire update:

 

 

Mill, Mountain, Rum Creek and SRF Complex – September 3, 2022

Cover photo by Traci Miner. September 2 was a busy fire day. Our September 3 Lookout Livestream covers the Mill Fire, Mountain Fire, Rum Creek Fire and Six Rivers Lightning Complex. We also talk about how agencies divide up responsibility for fire response, and about forest history around the Mountain Fire. Don’t miss an update. … Read more

Six Rivers & Rum Fire – September 1, 2022 Livestream

Happy September everyone. Zeke did a long video today and we’ve posted a transcript below. Zeke is livestreaming every morning at 7am Pacific Time on YouTube, unless otherwise noted on Twitter. He’s covering Rum Creek Fire and Six Rivers Complex every day at this time. Don’t miss his videos, subscribe to The Lookout’s YouTube channel. … Read more

Wildfire Drones & Aerial Firing – August 30, 2022 Livestream

In today’s livestream, we talked about new developments in the use of drones for monitoring and backfiring during wildfires. This is part of a longer daily update video on firing ops on the Six Rivers Lightning Complex and new growth on the Rum Creek Fire.

More information on the drone being used click here.

 

 

Seeing the Big Picture – August 27, 2022 Livestream

We talk about firing ops on the Six Rivers Lightning Complex, new growth on the Rum Creek Fire, and look at two fires being managed for resource benefits in Yosemite National Park. Also, an overview of some of the intel websites I use.

 

 

Six Rivers Lightning Complex – August 22, 2022

Here’s Zeke’s latest video from the morning of August 22. He’s answering live chat questions at the end of the videos these days, so if that appeals to you, he’s streaming on YouTube at 7am Pacific Time during the week.  Catch the live broadcast.

From Zeke:

We look at the growth of the fire on 8/21/2022, and look for patterns in historic logging and fire severity around the SRF Lightning Complex Fires near Trinity Village, Salyer and Willow Creek, Trinity County, California.

We also talk about fire severity mapping and the limitations of using satellite imagery.

 

 

 

Six Rivers Lightning Complex – August 19, 2022

Hi everyone! Here’s Zeke’s latest video on the SRF Lightning Complex with an exciting live Q&A with viewers during the last eight minutes of the stream. He looks at historic logging around the SRF Lightning Complex Fires near Trinity Village, Salyer and Willow Cree in Trinity County, California. He also looks at the Kennedy Fire, … Read more