Comments on: Pyrocumulus cloud

By: Daryl

Daryl — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 14:22:44 +0000

We had pyrocumulus here in southern California on Sunday, Sept. 2nd, from the “Williams” fire. At first, only a smoke plume was visible, with a smoke layer spreading out that extended to the east. At that time (3pm), media reports were that 30 acres had been burned. By 4pm, a large pyrocumulus cloud extended well above the plume itself, with the base of the cloud brownish from the smoke, but the top glistening white. Media reports stated that the fire grew to 700 acres in that hour! Considering that the fire departments were just getting their assets into place (evacuations were the top priority), it would seem that most of the water vapor came from burning plant material, rather than water poured onto the fire (the fire was said to have broken out around 2:15-2:30 pm, and was in rugged, mountainous terrain above Los Angeles).

By: Valerie

Valerie — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 16:37:29 +0000

After watching the weather channel report on pyrocumulus clouds I was wondering if they are only formed by fires from nature or natural things, such as, a wildfire or a volcano? Could they be formed from something like an oil fire? If that is possible, would this kind of cloud be potentially hazardous and dangerous? I am just an average in I.Q. so I figured there had to be someone much smarter than I who can answer this for me. Thank you for any input.

By: Mark

Mark — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 23:53:43 +0000

to even mention global warming when talking about nominal seasonal wildfires is just silly and hurts the bloggers cause. be that as it may, stay safe…..hope you all get out of that mess without too much harm

By: David C.

David C. — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 22:18:10 +0000

No science here, just a memory from 1971, when I went west to make some money fighting fires; driving up the Columbia in a truck, from Revelstoke, BC, we were stopped at a ford, and could see the fire scorched land around us, and further up, was this massive cloud, the air had been still, and it rose so high the upper winds got hold of it, just a pillar of smoke, with a mushroom top being swept by the air currents; something you don’t forget, especially as that was where we were headed;

By: skydaddy

skydaddy — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 17:49:51 +0000

Whoever said that water vapor isn’t a gas… um, no. Water vapor IS a gas, just like mercury vapor or sodium vapor or gasoline vapors. Vapor = gas. When the water vapor condenses into cloud droplets, it’s little tiny droplets of liquid water.

I *really* enjoyed the comment about “let’s wait for hard science to base decisions on and not jump to conclusions like the denialists.” Oh, the irony!

Yes, fires today are more destructive, because we’re building expensive homes in fuel dumps.

BTW you know what humans have historically done when the climate changes? Adapt.

By: Bipedal Tetrapod

Bipedal Tetrapod — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 17:14:11 +0000

Just to clarify a little, and forgive me if I missed it previously in the comments, but water is a product of the combustion itself. Most organic matter is carbon, hydrogen and oxygen (with nitrogen, phosphorus, sulphur). When the hydrogen is oxidized, it becomes water vapour. So wood that is dry as a bone will produce water vapour when burned, along with CO2 – and a zillion other things (like ash, soot, CO etc) from incomplete combustion and other constituents.

By: noen

noen — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 16:23:28 +0000

“The current intensification of fires in the western US has a lot more to do with forestry management practices than it does with climatic changes.”

And they are made worse by the droughts, higher temps, more intense storms that are related to climate changes. Increased fires is a prediction of global warming and globally there has been such an increase. The fires also only make a bad situation worse. They put CO2 into the air, expose the ground and cause erosion, remove trees which draw CO2 down from the environment and one would expect dust storms to follow. Global warming isn’t going away and stripping vegetation from the land doesn’t help.

Go outside and look around you. All of that can go away. It IS going away. People need to see these fires as a look at the future because whether or not they are directly caused by climate change now, they will be in the future.

The mother of all fold catastrophes is headed our way. We can no longer stop it. That opportunity is gone. Our 6° future is coming and if we want just to survive we’d better get ready.

By: VinceRN

VinceRN — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 16:10:26 +0000

@noen – neither does it follow that they are related to human activity. The fact that human activity has some effect on the environment does not me that everything is caused by human activity and natural processes are no longer functioning as you seem to think.

As for the rest of you ranting, you are taking an extreme worst case scenario and presenting it as irrefutable fact. Your doomsaying is no more likely to be true that any other sky is falling world is ending belief ever has been.

There is certainly a problem, but the world is not ending, nor is there any reason to believe it is.

Rant away in response, I’ll enjoy reading it.

By: Will

Will — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 15:14:11 +0000

The current intensification of fires in the western US has a lot more to do with forestry management practices than it does with climatic changes. Our blanket policy of stopping fires for the last six decades has, ironically, led to larger, less stoppable fires, even as more and more people have placed themselves in danger by building into firelands. The Forest Service has come around on this, but now that people have invested billions of dollars in homes in dangerous places, they are forced to pursue what they now know to be unsound fire suppression policies. Here is a nice little summary available from the Forest Service website http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/journals/pnw_2005_donovan003.pdf.

By: mike burkhart

mike burkhart — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 14:31:41 +0000

Every year we seem to have these fires maybe we should look at ways to prevent forest fires, bring back Smokey the Bear to do those public service messages.