Storms of smoke erupt with desert dry conditions

Thursday, June 8, 2011

I wish I was singing Here Comes the Rain again by the Eurythmics but the song of the day is Fire by Earth, Wind and Fire. You can see the fire that erupted 5 miles south of Mickler's Landing just after the noon show on one of our tower cams. The Division of Forestry had earlier closed portions of A1A and actually started on both sides of it before quickly moving west. Originally there were three brush fire trucks and now there is only one and A1A is back open so that hopefully is a sign the fire is being contained. We will keep you updated on the Guana State Park fire. Our Live Doppler radar certainly has kept us ahead of these fire storms. Check out these images.

A new fire also broke out just as quickly as the first one formed. Yes, Florida is on fire.

My least favorite weather to forecast is fires right after ice storms that I experienced while living in the Midwest. Unfortunately since I started updating this blog another much larger fire called the 5x5 Breakout fire near Steckert or about 3 miles east of 121.

Yes, the drought is taking its toll with a deficit of 22 inches and counting dating back to 2010. Here is the KBDI index I showed on the noon show which shows how much moisture the first eight inches of our soil holds. When you see deep reds and purple it means it is  desert dry and Glynn County is experiencing conditions normally seen in the desert southwest. Now it is easy to see why Florida is burning and we are evaporating about .50" of water from our plants and soil a day so until our thunderstorm season kicks in and the blocking southeast ridge weakens we are in deep trouble. Expect more fires to erupt and smoky skies over the next couple of days. Next week I am still optimistic about a change. I will have an update coming your way with RAIN. Make sure to check back.