US National Interagency Fire Center Wildfire Update for the Week Ending September 15th

The US National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) is reporting that as of Friday, September 15th, 67 large wildfires have burned more than 468,938 acres in 12 states. Two new large new wildfires were reported.

Approximately 10,200 wildland firefighters and support personnel are assigned to incidents across the nation. This includes 181 crews, 484 engines, 95 helicopters, and 15 incident management teams. The National Preparedness Level remains at a 3 out of 5.

The number of large new fires or emergency responses as of September 15th was 1. The number of active large fires stands at 59 (not including individual fires within complexes). There are currently 324,907 acres actively involved fires. The total number of wildfires fires contained currently stands at 2.

The updated year-to-date comparison is as follows:

• Year-to-date through September 15th, 42,502 wildfires have been reported and they have burned 2,181,540 acres.
• During the same period last year, 50,814 wildfires were reported, and they burned 6,784,624 acres.
• The 10-year average (2013–22) for the same period is 43,784 wildfires and 5,950,271 acres burned.

The ten-day national forecast remains highly regionalized. However, above normal temperatures predicted for the West Coast and Intermountain West, with humidity levels in the 10–35% range, are of major concern to the NIFC team. Elsewhere, the weather is becoming more seasonable, but opportunities for additional rain are limited, which could quickly dry out many parts of the country.