Right on cue, CBS news 60 minutes is expected link the recent California fires to “global warming”. Never mind that the fire was caused by arson, or that the area hadn’t burned in 40-60 years, leading up to a collection of dry dead underbrush which is part of the natural fire cycle. Never mind that La Nina made for a dry couple of years exacerbating the problem. Never mind that we get fires in California about this time every year. No, its the “Age of Megafires”:
THE AGE OF MEGAFIRES – Global warming is increasing the intensity and number of forest fires across the American West. Scott Pelley goes to the fire line to report. David Gelber and Joel Bach are the producers. Watch a preview http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=5285410n
UPDATE: WUWT reader Jason writes to tell us that this story is a rerun, and originally aired in 2007. See it here. I’ll bet the intro will mention the California fires though. They may have even “freshened up” the report a bit for the current situation.
I wonder if CBS borrowed the title from the Christian Science Monitor 2007 report?
Here is a top 20 report from CDF, note that they poo-poo 1932. Note also that there were quite a number of 100,00+ acre fires more than 10 years ago, directly contradicting the interview in the CBS trailer.
NYT was saying it is all getting worse back in 1996. Curiously though, you won’t find a single mention of “global warming” or “climate change” in that story. It was all about forest management issues:
But the recent methods used to control the growth of Western forests has also been blamed. In view of this summer’s debacle, debate is intensifying on how to better manage these forests.
Loggers correlate today’s wildfires with a Federally mandated cut in timber harvests from national forests, from a peak of 12 billion board feet a year in the 1980’s to about 4 billion this year.
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But after World War II, a Smokey the Bear ethic took hold in the West, and total fire suppression became a national goal. Without regular low-level fires, Western forests grew dense, and massive amounts of fuel built up.
Today, when a Western forest ignites, it often explodes with a force unknown in earlier times. Racing from tree crown to tree crown, fires last longer and travel farther.
Scott Pelley is the same reporter that went to Antarctic in 2007 at the height of the melt season to tell us that “Antarctica is Melting”. They called that one the “The Age of Warming” Of course Scott never told his viewers that it was the peak melt season or that Antarctic ice is above normal.
And finally, never mind that 100 years ago, we didn’t have CNN or 60 minutes or “Action News” to regularly scare us to death with dramatic visual linkages. Back then, fire were just another part of the natural landscape.
From my perspective , we live in the “Age of MegaFUD“
Ok Lodgepole pine is _not_ a primary species-it in the lower 48, in particular is a
secondary species.Something on the way to the primary, dominant, Species, like say,Ponderosa or Jeffery Pine.Lodgepole is prone to fire as part of it’s very nature.
fiber quality, and content makes it vulnerable.BTW springs seem to be getting a bit later here in NE Oregon. Snowpacks are variable by their very nature,and cyclical.
No, as someone who has been in and around the woods of the west most of my life,
man and boy,I do see man’s hand, but one of mismanagement,not I driving my F-150…
No, not particularly, not the way the story went/how it was explained that the Peshtigo fire was caused by embers from the Chicago fire (if memory serves me correct having read the story years back) and considering the dryness/the drought that I think they were having – no, not odd really …
Did you have something more? I was unaware that fires were ocurring across the lake in Michigan though.
“Never let a good crises go to waste” – owed contemoprarily to either Axelrod or Emmanual early 2009 (it is irrelevant in any case) but sometimes you have to create your own ‘crises’ by starting your own fire (referring now to the one or two fire-suppression people they have caught through the years involved in arson and for the creating of a ‘crises’ and an environment in which they felt they could ‘shine’, be of service and – wait for it – needed.)
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Severe bush fires?
Well, the ghost gum has evolved a silvery bark as a natural defence against wild fires, and many other trees have their own strategies. I imagine that this evolution could only have happened since 1970, as there were no fires before then.
Sorry … you say that ghost gums have been like that for thousands of years? Impossible, CO2 emissions only started in the ’70s.
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tallbloke (05:54:21) :
” the fire was caused by arson”
“Why do people do this? I’ve asked before, but no-one seems to know.”
I can tell you why in this case. The city of La Canada/Flintridge was discussing laying off a number of firefighters to save money in Californias current budget crisis. It is rather obvious that a firefighter, or a relative of one, set the Station fire to prevent a layoff.
The problem of laying off firefighters isn’t the threat of arson, but the knife to the taxpayer’s throat.You never hear of overhead getting the axe, do you…
Same for police and maintenance….
Bill Illis (16:28:21) : Canada Fires
I have seen those google maps satalitte images many times, but never drew a correlation to fires. You are probably correct. Some of those patches look to be about the size of California. Kind of brings things back into prospective.
Many of these Western ecosystems are fire dependent. Over time ALL chaparral will burn, ALL lodgepole forests will burn, ALL sequoia forests will burn. I’m amazed the eco-activists have so little understanding of ecology.
Jack Simmons (05:41:40) :
“We have some really serious forest management issues all through the Rockies here in Colorado and Wyoming.”
Yep, the forest is a match looking for a light.
I talked to a ranger at Rocky Mountain National Park, and he finally admitted that they would rather that it go ahead and burn and get it over with. Among other problems, they have had to clear trees from campgrounds due to the danger of falling limbs and trees.
I’m sure that it will be the fault of AGW when it happens.
Jim (21:41:53) (9-7-09)
“No, not particularly, not the way the story went/how it was explained that the Peshtigo fire was caused by embers from the Chicago fire (if memory serves me correct having read the story years back) and considering the dryness/the drought that I think they were having – no, not odd really …”
That’s just not credible. Peshtigo is 221 miles from Chicago. I’ve lived in Wisconsin my whole life except when I went to Northwestern University and I’ve never heard that.
Real answer: coincidence.
Well, now, yes it could be; you’re assuming a single ember traveling the ENTIRE distance in one fell swoop whereas the effects from the Chicago fire could have hop-scotched the distance –
– consider a successive series of fires, each producing embers, each ember successively producing fires further away …
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After having your post passed to me by my boss, I’ve taken a detailed look at the Megafires piece here:
http://www.stinkyjournalism.org/editordetail.php?id=486
In reporting, I found some interesting factual problems that I talk about in my story. While they’re not exactly the issues you bring up above (It seemed to me that a number of your critiques don’t really apply that well to this particular report) I invite you to check out my post and see what you think.
-Molly