Fire Management today Volume 63 • No. 3 • Summer 2003 WILDLAND FIRE BEHAVIOR CASE STUDIES AND ANALYSES: PART 1 United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service DEDICATION This special issue of Fire Management Today is dedicated to the memory of Paul M. Gleason (1946–2003). His passion for wildland firefighter safety and his deep professional interest in wildland fire behavior will be sorely missed. Martin E. Alexander and David A. Thomas Issue Coordinators Editor’s note: This issue of Fire Management Today reprints articles from early editions of the journal, some of them decades old. Although the articles appear in today’s format, the text is reprinted largely ver- batim and therefore reflects the style and usage of the time. We made minor wording changes for clarity, added intertitles and metric conversions where needed, and occasionally broke up paragraphs or broke out sidebars to improve readability. All illustrations are taken from the original articles. Erratum In the Spring 2003 issue of Fire Management Today, the table of contents showed an incorrect title for Stephen J. Pyne’s article (volume 63[2], page 17). The correct title is “Firestop II.” Fire Management Today is published by the Forest Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, DC. The Secretary of Agriculture has determined that the publication of this periodical is necessary in the transaction of the public business required by law of this Department. Fire Management Today is for sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, at: Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: 202-512-1800 Fax: 202-512-2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402-0001 Fire Management Today is available on the World Wide Web at <http://www.fs.fed.us/fire/fmt/>. Ann M. Veneman, Secretary April J. Baily U.S. Department of Agriculture General Manager Dale Bosworth, Chief Robert H. “Hutch” Brown, Ph.D. Forest Service Managing Editor Jerry Williams, Director Madelyn Dillon Fire and Aviation Management Editor Carol LoSapio Guest Editor Martin E. Alexander, Ph.D., and David A. Thomas Issue Coordinators The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) prohibits discrimination in all its programs and activities on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, religion, age, disability, political beliefs, sexual orientation, or marital or family sta- tus. (Not all prohibited bases apply to all programs.) Persons with disabilities who require alternative means for communication of program information (Braille, large print, audiotape, etc.) should contact USDA’s TARGET Center at (202) 720-2600 (voice and TDD). To file a complaint of discrimination, write USDA, Director, Office of Civil Rights, Room 326-W, Whitten Building, 1400 Independence Avenue, SW, Washington, DC 20250-9410 or call (202) 720-5964 (voice and TDD). USDA is an equal opportunity provider and employer. Disclaimer: The use of trade, firm, or corporation names in this publication is for the information and convenience of the reader. Such use does not constitute an official endorsement of any product or service by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Individual authors are responsible for the technical accuracy of the material presented in Fire Management Today. Fire today Management Volume 63 • No. 3 • Summer 2003 On the Cover: CONTENTS Wildland Fire Behavior Case Studies and Analyses: Value, Approaches, and Practical Uses . 4 M.E. Alexander and D.A. Thomas Blackwater Fire on the Shoshone . 9 Division of Fire Control The Factors and Circumstances That Led to the Blackwater Fire Tragedy . 11 A.A. Brown Lessons From Larger Fires on National Forests, 1938 . 15 Roy Headley Lessons From Larger Fires on National Forests, 1939 . 23 Historical photo from USDA Roy Headley Forest Service files showing Lessons of the McVey Fire, Black Hills National Forest . 25 A.A. Brown the Wheeler Fire in 1948 An Analysis of the Honey Fire . 29 “working down Bear Canyon C.F. Olsen toward Wheeler Gorge Camp” The Bower Cave Fire . 42 on the Los Padres National Leon R. Thomas Forest, CA. Photo: Forest The Possible Relation of Air Turbulence to Erratic Fire Service Photograph Behavior in the Southeast . 46 Collection, USDA Forest George M. Byram and Ralph M. Nelson The Pinyon–Juniper Fuel Type Can Really Burn . 52 Service, Washington Office, Dwight A. Hester Washington, DC (no. 451594; A Firewhirl of Tornadic Violence . 54 F.E. Dunham, 1948). Howard E. Graham Rate of Spread on a Washington Fern Fire . 56 William G. Morris Fire-Whirlwind Formation as Favored by Topography and Upper Winds . 59 Howard E. Graham Relationship of Weather Factors to Rate of Spread of the Robie Creek Fire . 63 The FIRE 21 symbol (shown below and on the R.T. Small cover) stands for the safe and effective use of A Key to Blowup Conditions in the Southwest? . 68 wildland fire, now and throughout the 21st century. Its shape represents the fire triangle Robert W. Bates (oxygen, heat, and fuel). The three outer red A Fire-Whirlwind in Alabama . 71 triangles represent the basic functions of Gordon Powell wildland fire organizations (planning, operations, and aviation management), and the three critical The Forest Fires of April 1963 in New Jersey Point aspects of wildland fire management (prevention, the Way to Better Protection and Management . 74 suppression, and prescription). The black interior represents land affected by fire; the emerging Wayne G. Banks and Silas Little green points symbolize the growth, restoration, The Harrogate Fire—March 15, 1964 . 79 and sustainability associated with fire-adapted B.J. Graham ecosystems. The flame represents fire itself as an ever-present force in nature. For more informa- The Fire Behavior Team in Action: The Coyote Fire, 1964 . 81 tion on FIRE 21 and the science, research, and John D. Dell innovative thinking behind it, contact Mike Apicello, National Interagency Fire Center, “Gleason Complex” Puts Up Huge “Plume”: 208-387-5460. A Tribute to Paul Gleason . 85 Paul Keller Interview With Paul Gleason . 91 Jim Cook and Angela Tom SHORT FEATURES Firefighter and public safety is Websites on Fire . 80 our first priority. Guidelines for Contributors . 95 Volume 63 • No. 3 • Summer 2003 3 WILDLAND FIRE BEHAVIOR CASE STUDIES AND ANALYSES: VALUE, APPROACHES, AND PRACTICAL USES M.E. Alexander and D.A. Thomas ince 1936, the Washington Office of the USDA Forest In an effort to unbury the past S Service has published a period- and to increase both institutional memory ical devoted to articles dealing with and organizational learning within the wildland a very wide range of fire manage- ment topics. The name of this jour- fire community, we are reprinting past articles nal has changed through the years, on fire behavior. from Fire Control Notes, to Fire Management, to Fire Management Notes, and finally to Fire Manage- This special issue of Fire Manage- ly support this notion and have ment Today.* A good many of the ment Today begins a series of three endeavored to reflect it in our indi- 243 issues that have been pub- consecutive issues with articles vidual work areas in fire research lished in the past 67 years have related to fire behavior. This issue and fire management, respectively included a fire-behavior-related contains the first of two install- (Alexander and Lanoville 1987; article. With the passage of time, ments of articles involving fire Thomas 1991). however, many of these articles behavior case studies and analyses have become “buried,” found only of wildfires; examples pertaining to The idea of relying on wildfires as a by the most intrepid researchers on prescribed fires are not included possible source of data is especially the shelves of major libraries. (e.g., Custer and Thorsen 1996). pertinent to empirically based The 19 case studies and analyses in schemes for quantitative fire In an effort to unbury the past and this issue are presented in chrono- behavior prediction that rely on to increase both institutional mem- logical order, from 1937 to 1967. this kind of information in whole ory and organizational learning The third issue in this series will or in part (e.g., Alexander 1985; within the wildland fire communi- be devoted to aids, guides, and Forestry Canada Fire Danger ty, the authors approached the edi- knowledge-based protocols Group 1992; Rothermel 1991). torial staff of Fire Management involved in forecasting wildland This fact is especially significant at Today with the idea of republishing fire behavior for safe and effective the extreme end of the fire intensi- a selection of these past fire-behav- fire suppression. ty scale, where experimental fires ior-related articles. We are pleased are exceedingly difficult to arrange that they took us up on our sug- General Value of Case (Alexander and Quintilio 1990; gestion. Studies Cheney and others 1998). The importance of documented case studies or histories of wildland Information gleaned from wildland fires has been repeatedly empha- fire behavior case studies has also Marty Alexander is a senior fire behavior sized by both fire managers and proved of value in testing and eval- research officer with the Canadian Forest fire researchers (e.g., Byram 1960; uating various fire models, theo- Service at the Northern Forestry Centre, ries, decision aids and support sys- Edmonton, Alberta; and Dave Thomas is Thomas 1994; Turner and others the regional fuels specialist for the USDA 1961). As long-time Forest Service tems, and management guidelines Forest Service, Intermountain Region, wildland fire researcher/adminis- (e.g., Anderson 1983; Haines and Ogden, UT. trator Craig Chandler (1976) has others 1986; Nelson 1993; Pearce noted, “Time and time again case and Alexander 1994). For example, * For more on the history of Fire Management Today, Lindenmuth and Davis (1973) used see Hutch Brown, “How Did Fire Control Notes histories have proven their value as Become Fire Management Today?” Fire Management training aids and as sources of an observation of the initial run of Today 60(1) [Winter 2000]: 8–14.