HUGE N.M. BLAZE BLAMED ON ERRORS, MISCALCULATIONS
U.S. Forest Service employees made multiple miscalculations, used inaccurate models and underestimated how dry conditions were in the Southwest, causing a planned burn to reduce the threat of wildfires to explode into the largest blaze in New Mexico’s recorded history, the agency said Tuesday.
The agency quietly posted an 80-page review that details the planning missteps and the conditions on the ground as crews ignited the prescribed fire in early April. The report states officials who planned the operation underestifolded,” mated the amount of timber and vegetation that was available to fuel the flames, the exceptional dry conditions and the rural villages and water supplies that would be threatened if things went awry.
Within hours of declaring the test fire a success that day, multiple spot fires were reported outside containment lines and there were not enough resources or water to rein them in.
“The devastating impact of this fire to the communities and livelihoods of those affected in New Mexico demanded this level of review to ensure we understand how this tragic event unU.S. Forest Chief Randy Moore wrote. “I cannot overstate how heartbreaking these impacts are on communities and individuals.”
As of Tuesday, the blaze had charred more than 533 square miles, making it the largest fire to have burned this spring in the U.S. It comes during a particularly ferocious season in which fire danger in overgrown forests around the West has reached historic levels due to decades of drought and warmer weather brought on by climate change.
The number of acres burned so far this year is more than two and half times the national average for the past 10 years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. So far, 31,000 wildfires have burned more than 5,000 square miles in the United States.
Anger and frustration have been simmering among residents and elected officials in northern New Mexico, where hundreds of homes have been destroyed and thousands of residents were displaced.
Many mountainsides have been reduced to ash and once towering ponderosa pine trees have been turned into charred toothpicks.