Thank you for these, pyrogeography
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Thanks norcalscan for the great geographic details and planning. This territory is unforgiving and a real challenge for Incident Managers. Also thanks for the mapping data. Glad they were able to swap out Feather River IHC, these and the other crews that have worked incredible hours, and quite frankly getting home and seeing your family is heaven to those crews working to protect everything they touch. Thank You.
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Friday midday narrative for the Elkhorn (and Glenn Zone, upper MNF-August complex)
(written more for a community FB group I keep updated, and not for the inside baseball people here)
The smoke inversion will lift midday as transport winds out of the S-SW start, which will bring all that smoke down into northern Tehama and western Shasta, hopefully up high and over us, although those winds come out of the bay so it will include all their fires as well. As soon as that smoke lifts over the incident the fire intensity will instantly increase. Winds on the fire will shift 180 after lunch today, from NNW to SSE and grow significantly. Then tonight, diurnals kick in and winds will come back downslope out of NW. That’s tiring for keeping up on the fire lines.
California, Nevada, Illinois and Utah National Guard air assets have been released. They were instrumental the last 3 weeks as every private and agency helicopter around have been working solid on all the CA fires. As other fires have subsided, we have picked up some private Chinooks, Skycranes, and some medium ships as well at Red Bluff Helibase.
Starting on the north eastern edge of Doe Fire, above Paskenta and Riley Ridge. Fire has still held to Riley Ridge but there are pockets of heat near the line still, up near Ball Rock. They were going to fire it off yesterday but weather conditions weren’t conducive to that. Hopefully they can get that today and make that entire line black. With the upcoming winds, it is critical to hold this line. Any spot over that into South Fork Elder Creek drainage changes the entire game up there. Working west on Doe, fire has been held up so far along Middle Ridge, not sure if they’re going to chase the slops over that dozer line or fall back east to Berry Ridge north of Three Prong. Looking at proposed lines, they are still planning on the large big-picture line from Ball Rock north up the M22 road to Snake Ridge, Raglin Ridge and Fish Ridge/Oven Lid. However their immediate strategy is to try to find a route to dig line closer to the fire edge, to connect the Berry Ridge dozer line over NW to the Elkhorn dozers coming down in the Twin Peaks area. That’s their ideal goal. If any of the northern edge of Doe blows existing lines with these winds, it’s a game changer and likely will burn all the way to Elkhorn along that M22 road and Fish Creek drainage to Ides Cove.
Now with the Elkhorn Fire, east side is good, focusing on the west side. Northern finger still going west inside the Wilderness flanking the ridge and wilderness boundary. A lot of the fire up on top is firing operations to keep the “wild” fire away from the line. They hooked it down Sanford Ridge a bit at East Low Gap. Not sure if they’re planning to hook it here, similar to original plan, but I think this is just a time saver so they don’t have fire nipping their ankles while they build primary containment lines further west past Rat Trap towards Stuart Gap and North Yolla Bolla and the 2017 Buck Fire there. This would eventually become the primary northern line for both Elkhorn and the Hopkins fire burning 5-6 miles west.
Southern finger behind Elkhorn Ridge. They had a successful firing operation late last night securing the line above Valentine Ridge and forcing the fire further west. So far fire has held north of the lines and working west into the wilderness. It’s just north of Ides Cove now. They have completed dozer line right through those trailheads to the west and south to Twin Peaks and the top of Boswell Ridge. Now they’re working with the Doe Fire to figure out how to connect that line over to Berry Ridge and/or lines coming west of M22.
With all the iron and crews pushing line all over this thing, I pulled out the completed dozer and crew line GPS data from the TGU operations as of last night, and threw it into Google Earth, along with last night’s IR mission.
Looking slightly NW towards the Elkhorn from over the Doe, right up the Fish Creek drainage and where the Tehama and Glenn Zones are trying to connect the dots.
Finally looking east at Elkhorn DIV A, and its westerly spread flanking the wilderness boundary. You can see the handline Feather River IHC had almost completed down Long Ridge before they went big box on Wednesday. While frustrating in the moment, it was apparent the southern finger below them, and the Hopkins to the west, would make this entire area an eventual loss. Great call on that.
Stay safe out there! Hot, dry and shifting winds all weekend.
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NorCal Scan. Thanks for your insightful posts. You mentioned the big box…Is the plan now to tie Elkhorn and Hopkins together ?
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Opinion only here, I think the plan first was to pull troops from the bottom knowing the risk was rising with the southern finger slop and weather conditions, and get back up on top. Then continue to reassess the situation. However that decision weighs heavier on the Forest side vs Calfire and I don’t think they are in Unified Command, more of a “unified understanding” at the moment considering the resource drawdown and scale of the situation.
All that to say, I think Hopkins and Elkhorn will eventually connect. And the western head of Doe.
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Thank you, I agree.
The fires to the south ran about 2 miles north yesterday, and spots out front are now about 4 miles from burning into Elkhorn.
Elkhorn is on upper-left.
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Pyrogeography… Thanks for your intel and posts. I wouldn’t be able to interpret these IR pics without your input. Just a WAG, but I’d say these fires will burn together in a few days…maybe before the next wind event.
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The country between the two is pretty high, looks kind of sparse. I’ve never been up there. Curious what kinds of conditions it needs to carry fire.
Quick Monday afternoon update, the northern finger up along Div A/B is (was) still behaving around Sanford Ridge at East Low Gap. A new Div ZZ was established today to define the space between Elkhorn and the Doe/Glenn Zone. It has spotted over this afternoon and is currently standing up and hands are under the table, about ready to flip the entire thing over.
Orange are the new Sections in which fire has gotten established. It spotted over the 25N16 line at the Ides Cove trailhead into Section 12. The entire Div fell back to DP-41 and their safety zones to regroup and draw new lines. Tried to go the 25N42 road just right of the “ZZ”, but fire has since impacted that established in Sec 13. So falling back to a line roughly diagonal from Oven Lid to DP-46 but not sure how realistic that is in upcoming WX (highlighted purple.) The Fish Ridge area has been well-prepped so it’s ready to get some action. Also, they’re pulling the contingency card and looking at the Ball Rock 25N01 road (highlighted green), which is their last stand to to the east, before getting back down into the foothills and South Fork Elder Creek, which is an ugly area.
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Elkhorn made a big run to the south yesterday, squirted up over the crest of the South Yolla Bolly Mountains. IR from 9pm on 9/7/2020. VIIRs and MODIS from later in the night both show the fires merging, with about 10,000 acres of new growth, with spread east toward Raglin Ridge.
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The bulk of that southward spread I believe was a firing operation yesterday on Div X. It was getting good depth but spotted over yesterday afternoon. Big plan was eventual tie in with the southern fire, just not the spotting to the east. They’re giving that drainage that ZZ and YY have been fighting for, to the fire today and falling back to the 25N01 Ball Rock road where they have a good anchor and start firing north from Ball Rock. Little by little, continually evaluate and make it to Snake Ridge (the new YY). If successful, then continue north to Fish Ridge (the new ZZ). They’ll also be working from Oven Lid NE towards lines in Div X to build some immediate contingency.
The VIIRS hits up on the top looks like the smoke columns for Elkhorn and Hopkins are joining - got the telltale scattered pattern between the two, and it’s getting close.
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http://www.alertwildfire.org/shastamodoc/index.html?camera=Axis-SaintJohn1
impressive at 1300hrs
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That is the MNF complex . But yes, impressive!
CIIMT5 transitioned Tuesday and should have the fire tomorrow morning. There will be no calfire or local government resources on federal ground as of 8am Wednesday.
re you talking chief officers or ground resources?
I believe suppression and all. The statement was in response to someone planning for what to do with some slops and what resources they could plan on for day. With other scuttle that I’m hearing, it’s definitely a…change. 7am briefing will paint the picture.
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I’m sorry but can you clarify what exactly this means?
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Per NOPS AM update: 255,309 acres grass and brush, 27% contained. This fire consists of Elkhorn, Vinegar, Hopkins and Willow Fires which have all merged. California Type 1 IMT 5 (Young) in Command.
MODS: This is now a SHF incident
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The eastern (TGU) CalFire side of this is rapidly getting tied up and radio traffic diminishing. There is a new q/a thread for the SHF-Rock Complex that should cover any future updates as this thing pushes west.
9/11 update: this fire is now the North Zone of the MNF-August Complex. That’s much more reasonable considering this will basically chew through what’s left of the Mendocino NF after the 2018 Ranch.
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