Santa on Tuesday Ana winds sweep southern California toward the sea, scattering embers and fanning the flames of growing wildfires. As night fell, residents received emergency text alerts warning of possible wind gusts of up to 100 mph. This was a dire situation that turned a precarious situation into a full-blown crisis. As the wind picked up, more embers flew, sparking new fires in dry, fragile bushland that had not seen much rain in eight months.
Los Angeles County, in the midst of a drought-like situation, was a powder keg waiting for a spark. Firefighters fought against winds so strong that the plane that was dropping water and flame retardants ran aground. “All residents of Los Angeles County are at risk,” officials warned in a news release Wednesday morning. Tens of thousands of residents have been displaced since evacuation orders were issued, and thousands more await updates. By Wednesday evening, three large fires had consumed more than 13,000 acres and containment efforts had been delayed. The Palisades Fire in Pacific Palisades and Malibu, the Hurst Fire in Sylmar, and the Eaton Fire near Pasadena showed no signs of slowing down. As of the time of this writing. It is 0% contained and has already become the most destructive case in California history.
The unusually dry and windy conditions caused the fire to turn into a disaster all too quickly. “Even small sparks from lightning, people, campfires, etc. can quickly escalate,” says Jennifer Marlon, a research scientist and lecturer at Yale University. School of the Environment and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. “When fires break out under these conditions, they are very difficult to control,” added Kaitlyn Trudeau, senior climate science researcher at Climate Central, a non-profit media organization.
Santa Ana wind events are not uncommon. “We see it every year around this time,” said Jason Moreland, chief meteorologist at AlertMedia, an emergency communications platform. These downslope winds that occur inland are caused by dry high pressure from the northwest and low moisture pressure from the south. “It’s like having a hose and folding it in half to shut off the water. “If you drill a hole in your side, the pressure to get out increases,” Trudeau explained. “That’s basically what happens in the air.”
But these winds are much stronger than usual due to a decrease in the jet stream near the Baja Peninsula in northwestern Mexico, Moreland explains. Typically, winds pushed to higher elevations are reaching lower terrain areas. “We only see winds of this magnitude every few decades,” he says.
This wind event may seem extreme, but Noah Diffenbaugh, a professor and senior researcher at Stanford University, said: Woods Environmental Research InstituteHe explained that this may just be due to natural weather fluctuations and that more research is needed to know if it is due to climate change.
But while winds are not unseasonal, climate change increasing the risk Information about late or early wildfires in California. “Not only are we seeing particularly strong winds, but this is also a particularly dry season for early January,” Diffenbaugh said. Southern California’s rainy season, which runs from October to April, brought record-low precipitation following one of the driest seasons on record. Precipitation remains the same There are more variables due to climate change.The overlap between windy seasons and dry seasons is increasing. “We are seeing a lot more hot, dry, windy days, especially in Southern California,” Trudeau said.
