COLORADO, USA — Data shows that most wildfires in the United States are caused by humans, but this summer in Colorado, a weather phenomenon known as dry lightning is to blame for most of our large wildfires.
It’s called “dry” lightning when a thunderstorm drops less than a tenth of an inch of rain.
That’s usually not enough rain to extinguish a lightning fire immediately, but the main problem is the wind gusts that fan the flames and spread the fire.
When rain falls through air that is very dry, like it’s been this summer in southern Colorado with relative humidity lower than 15%, most of it evaporates causing strong wind gusts.
Five of the six large wildfires currently burning in the state were started by dry lightning.
1. The Quartz Ridge Fire northeast of Pagosa Springs and just south of Wolf Creek Pass is the latest wildfire to spring up. The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) said it was discovered on Aug. 5, and they believe it was caused by dry lightning. The fire was very active in Red Flag conditions on Monday and grew to 558 acres by Tuesday morning. A Type 3 Incident Management Team (IMT) has been assigned to the fire so there is no containment yet.
2. The Bear Creek Fire in Hinsdale County is northwest of Pagosa Springs. The USFS said it's a lightning-caused fire that was discovered on Aug. 1, but did not flare up until it was hit with Red Flag weather conditions on Sunday. This fire has also been assigned a Type 3 IMT. It was only mapped at 155 acres on Tuesday morning and no containment lines have been built just yet.
3. The Dry Lake Fire is a lightning-caused fire to the west of Pagosa Springs. On Tuesday morning it was listed as 1,372 acres in size and was 65% contained.
4. The Coal Mine Fire is a lightning-caused fire wildfire that was discovered on June 26 to the south of Pagosa Springs. It only grew to 286 acres and is at 95% containment.
5. The Lowline Fire is a lightning-caused fire in Gunnison County that was listed at 1830 acres on Tuesday morning with 55% containment.
6. The Spring Creek Fire in Garfield County south of Parachute burned 3,256 acres and is listed as 90% contained. The cause of this fire is undetermined. All six of Colorado’s large wildfires are burning in remote locations and there are no mandatory evacuation orders in place. But there are air quality alerts for wildfire smoke in Archuleta, Hinsdale and Gunnison Counties.
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