Fire Breaks Loose

Fire is a wily beast.

Anyone who dismisses that as too anthropomorphic risks being blinded to the dynamics of wind and flame by his or her material view of the universe.

On Sunday the Las Conchas fire had exploded in the Bandelier National Monument. It quickly spread to 60,740 acres, then seemed to slow down. In the next three days it grew another 36,982 acres to 92,722 acres, a sixth the pace.

To the south where it had threatened Cochiti it encountered lighter fuels that slaked its appetite. To the north it was hedged by the grassy remains of the Cerro Grande fire of 2000. It seemed content going west.

At noon on Thursday, June 30, the Los Alamos fire chief said “We’re starting to turn the corner on this fire.” The fire service’s information officer had already assured people that “fire is a science,” that a fire behaviorist could study the way a fire behaves and predict what it would do. There were even hopes it would rain.

Driving home the sky was dark and stormy. The winds were picking up. When I turned into my valley, I left the clouds behind, but I could see a rainbow to the east from whence I’d just come.



To the west there was strong plume of pink smoke rising from the Jemez.

While we were being lulled by pronouncements that the fire was held at bay at the borders of the lab, it had been inching north unheralded. When you looked at the infrared map from that morning, you could see it had entered Santa Clara land where it was already even with the scar’s northern tip.

Just as it moved north of the limiting old fire bed, the winds picked up.

While I was at work, the pueblo governor had declared a state of emergency. The fire had burned 6,000 acres in the watershed, all the land in the headwaters of the Santa Clara creek that feeds their irrigation system.



The winds continued to rise. The sun turned red. The pink plume turned dark grey, The smoke rising above turned orange in the reflection of the sun.

Then the sky grew dark. The lights of the gas station at the base of the road that leads to Puye cliffs and Santa Clara canyon came on to the right of my neighbor’s Siberian elm.

The winds were howling about the house. Dots of orange appeared above a ridge. Then the dots merged into a broad U-shaped line with a blur of red to the north where I could see shadows of bare tree trunks.



When I woke at midnight, the winds had stopped. The stars were out. The big dipper hung off the west end of the porch. Los Alamos was a white line, either from the fire or lights in town. The Santa Clara fire was a long static red line, no longer pulsing.

When I woke again at 5:45, the dew had fallen. The mountains were gone. There were no signs of smoke or fire. A half hour later, the lights of the gas station are out. The sandstone cliffs were etched in the sun. Those who had slept through the night woke reassured man could master the universe.

Notes:
Baca, Joe. Las Conchas Fire Burns More Than 6,000 acres of Santa Clara Pueblo Land,” 30 June 2011 press release.

Pitassi, Brad. United States National Forest Service, Southwest Area Type I Incident Management Team information officer. Quoted by Staci Matlock, “Los Alamos Residents Flee Growing Las Conchas Fire,” Santa Fe’s The New Mexican, 27 June 2011.

Tucker, Doug, Los Alamos fire chief. Quoted by Carol A. Clark, “Fire Battle Begins to Turn Corner,” Los Alamos Monitor, 30 June 2011.

United States National Forest Service. “Las Conchas Progression” map, 30 June 2011.

Picture 1. Smoke from the Santa Clara fire, 30 June 2011 about 7:56pm; just to the right of the Siberian elm in the center is the gas station at the base of the road to Puye cliffs.

Picture 2: Rainbow to the east, 30 June 2011 about 6:24pm.

Picture 3: Smoke from the Santa Clara fire, 30 June 2011 about 6:25pm, where the rainbow as shining to the east.

Picture 4: Santa Clara fire, 30 June 2011 about 9:19pm; the red blur is above the gas station. With the high winds and slow shutter speed, it was impossible to get a picture that doesn’t have some camera movement.
system.