Texas wildfires

Edited on October 24, 2017 to strike out or removed outdated links and video embed code

Where to begin on the wildfires in Texas? I expect that most of you have heard about the wildfires that have been burning in Texas for the last couple of weeks from various media.  I am not even going to try to summarize all the fires that have burned hundreds of thousands of acres in Texas largely, but not exclusively, in rural areas of the State.  Nonetheless, evacuations have been or may still be in place in different locations and residences have been destroyed by the fires. There is a nice article and video from CNN where you may learn more about this wildfire, go here to see the CNN report and video.

According to Lubbock Online (4/18/11 @ 12:11 AM):

• Governor Rick Perry is asking the federal government for help.
• Two C-130s equipped with Modular Airborne Fire Fighting Systems (MAFFS) dropped retardant one of the Texas wildfires.
• Two helos with buckets worked the fire in southwestern Austin.

Death of a firefighter

It is with great sadness that I write about the death of volunteer firefighter, Greg Simmons, this past Friday. I offer my condolences to Greg's family, friends, colleagues and all who loved him. Bill Gabbert of Wildfire Today writes about Greg here and here.

Air Support

When I went and read the TX Forest Service situation report update written on April 18, 2011 at 11:46 local time (this link is outdated but I am not removing the link so you know where I got the information from), they reported on two C-130 MAFFs that had dropped retardant in a fire burning in the Del Rio area (also reported by Lubbock Online above). In that same "situation report", the TX forest service reports that a tanker base is in the process of being set up in the Midland area to support a DC-10 tanker, and that the Dyess Air Force Base is being set up to support four MAFFS. These resources are in addition to the two helos mentioned earlier and other air resources deployed to the fire. Wildfire Today is also reporting about the mobilization of more air tankers to Texas (and other updates) here.

Where to go for information

As I write this, the Inci Web incident information system has several pages devoted to Texas wildfires. The Texas Forest Service has a current report in pdf format that has been updated at least once a day during this current wildfire siege. An html version of the latest situation report from the Texas Forest Service may be found here. Another good source of information is the morning report (pdf format) put out by the Southern Area Coordinating Center with a summary of current fires burning in TX and other states in the SACC region.