Texas A&M Forest Service prepared for wildfire danger as temperatures heat up

COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) – As it continues to get hotter and drier, the Texas A&M Service is warning about the potential risk of wildfires.

According to the Forest Service, the months of July and August normally have the highest potential for wildfire and that remains the case this year. Recently the National Interagency Fire Center bumped up its national preparedness level to three out of five at a time when it would normally be set at level two this time of year. The NIFC said the greatest wildfire risk is in the West, the West Coast and the Great Plains.

Erin O’Conner with the Texas A&M Forest Service said that in Summer many wildfires are driven by fuel such as dry vegetation instead of wind.

“We’ve benefited from a lot of rainfall over the last three, four, six weeks, and over the past seven days we’ve seen that kind of dry up, so we’ve seen drier field conditions, less rainfall and we’re starting to see and increase in wildfire activity,” O’Conner said.

The summer season does create some challenges.

“They may not grow as fast or as large, but they hold heat a lot longer and they typically require more resources to put out and that makes it a challenge,” O’Conner said.

So far in 2024, there have been more than 30 wildfires in the state of Texas with a few popping up in just the last couple of days, O’Conner said.

“We have these preparedness levels and these are planning assumptions and actions that are dictated by fuel and weather conditions current and expected wildfire activity and also the availability of resources,” O’Conner said.

thanks to predictive services, the forest service can pinpoint where an increase in activity could happen.

“Our firefighters train year round so they are always prepared to respond to wildfires but also all hazard incidents, so with the science telling us where we might have activities we can place firefighters, we can place aircraft, we can place equipment to respond to any request for assistance,” O’Conner said.

The Texas A&M Forest Service says it currently has around 30 personnel responding to wildfires in Alaska, New Mexico, Arizona, and Oregon.

“We in the state of Texas bring in resources from out of state when we are having an increase in wildfire activity, so this is our opportunity to help our neighbors in their time of need. It’s also really great training for our folks, so they learn a lot of great skills and they bring that back to the state of Texas when we have an increase in wildfire activity,” O’Conner said.