Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World

On the morning of May 2, Shandra Linder was still unconcerned about the fire looming on the horizon. Her attitude reflected the general feeling in town: The fire seemed ominous but ultimately was not a significant threat. Meanwhile, Blake, Schmitte, and Allen held another press conference. They continued to downplay the threat, fearing the consequences of widespread panic, though Schmitte and Allen both knew at this point that wind-propelled embers from the fire would certainly fly over the firebreak and start fires in town. They counseled caution, noting that the temperature was almost 30°F higher than the average high for that time of year and that the humidity level was only 15%, much drier than usual. Climate change had exacerbated an already risky time of year.

Schmitte privately recalled the Chisholm fire, a 2001 wildfire that achieved “legendary status.” In late May, a senior wildfire expert with the Alberta government received a phone call from Washington, DC. They had detected a plume of smoke so huge that it rose into the stratosphere over Alberta, over 45,000 feet. This type of smoke had previously been seen only during volcanic eruptions. The Chisholm fire “set a terrifying new standard for fire on Earth” (90). Ignited by a spark from a freight train and aided by warming temperatures, the Chisholm fire was at least 20 times as intense as a normal wildfire, and some likened its sudden devastation to a series of bombs. The energy that the firestorm released at its seven-hour peak was later calculated as equivalent to 17 one-megaton hydrogen bombs, or about “four Hiroshima bombs per minute” (92). It represented a terrifying development in fire’s capability. Schmitte kept that in mind while addressing the public but considered a catastrophe a distant possibility given the firefighters’ tireless work. A fire had never necessitated a full town evacuation, and no one expected that the coming hours might require one. However, given rising temperatures due to climate change, this expectation was no longer realistic.

The text notes that “[a] fire in the boreal is as certain as death” (98): Forest fires occur several times a year in any given region, and the natural fire cycle is vital to the boreal trees. Several types of trees cannot reproduce unless the extreme heat of fire cracks their seed pods. Thus, human settlements in the boreal forest are especially vulnerable to fire despite proximity to water. In addition, oil processing plants are uniquely flammable, and a constant air system from the Arctic north keeps the air dry. Up until 2016, Fort McMurray was extremely lucky, managing to fight back all the blazes that had reached the settlement. However, due to climate change exacerbating the heat and dryness, circumventing this fire by normal means was impossible. Partly due to Fort McMurray’s luck in the past and partly because officials downplayed the situation to keep people calm, the town lacked a sense of urgency about the fire.

Schmitte, on a radio show at noon on May 3, commented in real time, on air, about worrying signs that the fire was surpassing predictions. During the show, he observed the fire’s “crossover,” when ambient temperature exceeds relative humidity, such that the environment no longer tamps down a fire but instead feeds it. After crossover, a fire is “set free” to rise in temperature, in turn creating stronger wind, which compounds the heat, providing more oxygen to the fire and allowing it to grow even more. Despite observing the crossover, however, Schmitte advised citizens to “carry on their normal day” (107), believing that even though the fire was far exceeding their predictions, it wouldn’t jump the firebreaks.

Shandra Linder, while driving to a meeting, spotted a tower of black smoke with streaks of red. Confused, she pulled over, believing that the cloud’s size meant that it was much closer than she expected. Seeing that the cloud was so massive that it took over the sky, Linder realized that the fire was a much bigger threat than officials had indicated.

Most natural disasters are limited to a specific area, like tsunamis on coasts, earthquakes on fault lines, or floods near rivers. However, “fire can occur anywhere there’s fuel” (113), which includes virtually all material except rock, water, metal, and dirt. Consequently, human settlements are uniquely vulnerable to fire, and it can overtake buildings quickly and unpredictably.

In Fort McMurray, the municipal firefighters mostly responded to motor vehicle accidents; the town often had fewer than five house fires per year. These firefighters lacked the experience to comprehend the danger of the looming fire. Slave Lake firefighters Jamie and Ryan Coutts arrived in Fort McMurray with extra equipment. Once they saw the fire, they informed the city’s fire captain that losing part of Fort McMurray that day was unavoidable. This warning galvanized Darby Allen, the wildfire chief, whom the Coutts urged to “do what’s right for the people” (117). Evacuation became increasingly certain. However, the logistics of evacuating an entire town are daunting even in ideal conditions, so officials argued about how to handle it. The oil companies Suncor and Syncrude were unwilling to shut down their operations since even a day’s delay could cause their stock prices to plummet. However, at this point, the fire was about to overrun the Abasand and Beacon Hill neighborhoods, so Darby Allen, at the Couttses’ urging, realized that he needed to follow his gut.

At this point, the fire was so hot that even water-retaining trees like aspen and poplar essentially vaporized as the flames reached them. This effect was incomprehensible to the firefighters, who realized that the fire posed a grave threat to the town. At 2:05 pm on May 3, officials gave the first evacuation orders. Families quickly packed essentials and prepared to leave but did not understand the danger until the “fire was breaking over Beacon Hill like a wave” (127). Still, some locked their doors, not believing that their homes could burn down.

People drove through every available area, including sports fields and parks, to escape burning streets. The only exits from the city were highways, however, and soon traffic forced people to inch down the road, packed tightly as everyone tried to escape. They were courteous and helpful to one another despite the dangerous circumstances. Quickly, cars became unexpected sanctuaries from the flames, protecting their occupants from deadly heat. Families contemplated escape strategies should their cars burst into flame.

Chief Troy Palmer, an off-duty firefighter called in to help fight the fires, made his way to the fire station nearest to the burning neighborhoods but, predictably, got stuck in traffic. On the way, he witnessed the entire southern hillside of Fort McMurray on fire, an unimaginably huge spread of flame. When he joined his fellow firefighters, they realized that the calm and orderly methods they were trained to follow were useless in this catastrophe. Instead, they reverted to a military-style response, relying on their captains to give orders and then improvising to carry them out. Palmer was assigned to take a truck to a nearby station and grab all the gear he could find since many off-duty firefighters showed up wearing civilian clothes. On the way, he “felt disoriented” since so many familiar landmarks had been completely incinerated.

Wildland and urban firefighters have very different tasks and thus use different strategies. However, wildfires sometimes collide with urban fires, forcing firefighters to adopt new strategies on the fly. This collision zone is called the “wildland-urban interface” (140). Many people like to live in a wildland-urban interface zone since access to human community and nature feels like the best of both worlds. However, human homes in the forest provide a feast of perfect fuel for fires. Houses before the 1900s were built in open fields and had tin or slate roofs to prevent fires, but rapidly constructed developments in the last century largely abandoned fire prevention as a priority, and thus human homes are ideal fuel. Palmer and his fellow firefighters quickly realized that they could not beat back the fire and instead turned their efforts toward evacuating stragglers.