Monday, July 09, 2007

Fires rage across the western US

Astounding. South Dakota, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona. The map on the left is the dewpoint across the US. It is high across much of the east, where we're enduring a stretch of humid weather (high of 36 C in Princeton today). But quite low out west, reflecting the dry conditions.

Has the epidemic of wildfires reached the point that we need to talk about the summer fire season the way we talk about the hurricane season? Should we be as concerned, or maybe even more concerned, about the migration to the edge of the national forests as the migration of people to the coasts in the southeast?

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