Fire Weather from Texas

[David Drummond]

I've been out chasing more fire weather than convective weather so far this year!
There was a huge wildfire outbreak across Texas on Friday. I was covering the one west of Wichita Falls, TX.

Here are my favorite photos out of over 200. I'll have video out tomorrow.

http://daviddrummond.com/wildfires/2011-wichita-county-tx-wildfire.html

http://daviddrummond.com/wildfires/2011-wichita-county-tx-wildfire.html

 

[Jason Boggs]

Nice shots as always David. Just hate to see the destruction from all of these fires in Texas.

 

[Tom Tackett]

Unfortunately, serious to extreme fire weather looks like it will prevail for the foreseeable future across portions of the Southern Plains, especially along and west of the I-35 corridor. Just looked at weather forecasts for west Texas cities and little if no rain is in the forecast with temperatures in the 95'F to 100'F range on some days this week. There was even a serious brush fire in the Texas hill country near Austin today with destruction to some nice homes and damage to others.

 

[John Roberts]

Amazing Pictures David. Thanks for posting those!

 

[Bill Tabor]

I might find it interesting to check out fire weather, but the asthma from allergies I think would kill me.

 

[David Drummond]

This new stuff my doc put me on has been working wonders. It's very difficult to get access to cover these sometimes, unless your doing it from a distance at the road blocks. Only my association with NBC has gotten me in some of the fires, including this one.

For anyone thinking about it, make no mistake, the way I've been doing it is extremely dangerous. I was IN the burn area, and had fire on 4 sides of me at a couple of points. Previous fire training helped me to know where I thought I could be safe, but you are never really 100% safe in these things. When you have high winds, extremely dry fuels, low humidity and warm temps, you get some dangerous fire animals that behave in unpredictable ways. I just wanted to say that, I'd hate for anyone to think I was making it look easy or safe and try to do what I am doing so to speak, and end up burned up. I know the risks I take, I go in alone, and do my best to stay out of the way.

 

[Keith Turner]

I would highly advise no one but the most experienced try to film wildfires from up close. Staying in the burned is the only safe way to do so. Even then its not advisable. I'm glad you had previous fire training David! You got some great pictures!

 

[jason kissam]

i was watching the stream that you had last week. i saw several firenados pop up along the tree line. great job filming

 

[David Drummond]

Yeah those firenadoes where definitely something I was able to finally capture. They have eluded me for some time now.

 

[David Drummond]

I'm still trying to get the video edited down to the best minutes out of 2 hours of video. I'm down to about 14 minutes, and it's getting hard to cut it down more, but I'm afraid people on the net might not have enough attention span for that long.

 

[jason kissam]

i would
back in 2008 when i was a fire fighter i was on a large brush fire east of colorado springs that was sparked by lightning during a weird thunderstorm. i was in a burned out area helping douse hot spots and a 8 ft firenado came up right next to me with in inches. i about messed my pants. that was a close call. even watching the live feed you had my co workers were in awe of the fury that was unfolding. unfortunate that a volunteer fire fighter passed away while fighting the fires over the weekend. thanks again for sharing the footage.

 

[Michael Nicolaou]

Watching these closely, had a cousin lose an empty homestead in the aspermont blaze a few weeks ago and now my in-laws are eyeing the Wildcat fire north of SJT as it gets within 7 miles of them. Good news is the majority of the land between them and the blaze is cotton farmland that has been tilled already so it shouldn't be able to advance into the city of Miles proper.

 

[Scott MacArthur]

Got 2 friends that have lost their home in the PK lake area now. Very sad!