Fire Tornado Wreaks Havoc in California
Every few months it seems as though a new form of extreme weather comes to the forefront. This time, it’s a fire tornado, but this is just the latest in a long line of strange weather phenomenon, everything from derechos to microbursts to massive dust storms to Armageddon-inducing solar storms.
Anatomy of the California Fire Tornado
The fire tornado occurred during the Carr fire on July 26, 2018 (note: there is no universally accepted term for a fire tornado; it has been referred to as a plume tornado, fire vortex, fire whirl, and even a firenado).
Scientists from all over the globe agree that it was an extremely rare weather event fueled by extreme heat and the dry, drought-like conditions in the area. It lasted a whopping 1.5 hours, was approximately five football fields in diameter, and had peak wind speeds of 143 mph. It’s a scary scenario, particularly because a fire vortex like this can alter the course and pattern of forest fires on a dime, creating extremely unsafe situations for fire fighters.
Not much is known about these fiery monsters – the last well-documented case of a fire tornado impacting a residential neighborhood was over 15 years ago in Australia. More research is needed to uncover the true cause of the phenomenon. But this LA Times article has a decent amount of detail on the structure of the Carr fire tornado, including a diagram and some video footage.
Luckily, there seems to only be a small percentage of the U.S. that is at risk for this phenomenon. But the bigger picture is really about climate change, which is the root cause of weird weather events like a fire tornado. It’s an “inconvenient truth” that definitely does not make disaster planning any easier, that’s for sure.
