ShareThisNear-normal rainfall amounts during the winter and continued moisture through April and May have increased fire danger in Southern California's desert but may delay the wildfire season in other areas, experts say.
Fall could be a dangerous fire season, once all that rain-fed vegetation dries out completely, authorities said.
The weather during May, June and July will determine just how long moisture will remain in the brush in wild areas, the key element in fire potential.
Officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration expect the three-month period to bring above-average temperatures, sucking the moisture out of brush and trees and leaving them susceptible to flames.
But local fire officials in some areas say the temperate conditions that have extended through May could delay the onset of the most severe fire danger, leading to a potentially better-than-average year.
Bruce Risher is intelligence coordinator for the U.S. Forest Service, in Riverside, and part of a team that recently issued a comprehensive outlook for fire danger in California. The report predicts warmer-than-average temperatures during the early summer months and a later onset of the monsoon season, when moisture pulled in from the Gulf of California often brings thunderstorms to the mountains and desert. The storms can bring badly needed moisture, but they can also produce lightning, increasing the potential for wildfire.
"We're going to have large fires, but it won't be like 2003," Risher said. "We have basically broken the drought this year. That's a good thing."
At least in context.
"Large fires are part of the ecology here," he said. "If I were to guess at the number of fires, you could expect four to five large fires in the Riverside area, and that's just a normal year, between now and August."
Risher and others said greater rainfall in the desert over the winter months -- some areas received double their normal precipitation -- means a greater danger for fire there.
David Kelley, division chief for the San Bernardino National Forest, said that is because the desert grasses are denser this year.
"Last year we may have had 20 plants per meter, this year we have maybe 80," Kelley said. "It doesn't take as much energy for the fire to move from one piece of grass to the next. Instead of needing an eight-mile-an-hour wind, it might only take a four-mile-an-hour wind."
Judy Bartzatt, chief ranger at Joshua Tree National Park, said she is seeing plenty of new growth in the park.
No extra precautions are planned, but Bartzatt said fire is always a major concern.
"The park service fire crew is going to be available, and we will have seven-day-a-week coverage, but we always do during the summer," Bartzatt said. "We always put out to visitors to maintain their fires in the campgrounds and no open fires in the back country."
Risher says that danger will exist for the next couple of months.
"Those grasses dry up and blow away," he said. "We're looking at by the end of August, that won't be an issue anymore."
Continued precipitation, such as the light rain in some areas Monday, means the vegetation in the foothills and mountains won't dry out as quickly.
On the other hand, Risher said, "It's just going to delay the inevitable."
By late summer, the fire danger will be full-blown in the foothills and mountains.
Summer temperatures are expected to be higher than normal, said Mike Halpert, deputy director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center.
The prediction, Halpert said, means temperatures are expected to be elevated by "at least a degree Fahrenheit. It could be more than that."
Despite the abundance of vegetation to burn, Risher expressed optimism about the coming fire season.
"I think we're going to be in for a safer and less destructive year, I hope," he said. "There's always a surprise or two. We'll see how it goes."
(E-mail reporter Mark Muckenfuss at mmuckenfuss(at)PE .com. For other stories, visit www.scrippsnews.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Must credit The Press-Enterprise of Riverside, Calif.
