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Should the US Air Force Bomb Forest Fires? (popularmechanics.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Popular Mechanics: Earlier this summer, the Swedish Air Force dropped a laser-guided bomb on a forest fire to help suppress the flames. Now there's a proposal for the United States to do the same, using the might of the U.S. Air Force to fight America's raging forest fires via bombs and sonic booms. F-15 Strike Eagle Weapon System Officer Mike Benitez, writing in War on the Rocks, proposes using B-1 bombers stuffed to the gills with bombs to battle wildfires on the American homefront. The idea here is to snuff out fires the way you'd blow out birthday candles at the base. In Sweden, the shockwave from a single bomb snuffed out flames within a 100-yard radius of the impact point. So, Benitez reasons, why not load up a heavy strategic bomber with up to 84 bombs and do some serious firefighting?
Benitez chose the B-1 for his hypothetical scenario not only because of its bomb-carrying capability, but for the same reason the heavy bomber became a close air support platform of choice in Afghanistan: its long range translated into persistence over the battlefield, enabling the big bomber to hang around above friendly forces and bomb the Taliban for hours. The B-1 could do donuts in the skies over a wildfire as firefighters on the ground work out the best way to tackle it. The B-1 wouldn't carry just any bomb, either, but ordinance that was designed for firefighting. Most bombs use a steel casing that fragments into deadly shrapnel, but this would be unnecessary (and dangerous) when fighting fires. A firefighting bomb would use a combustible casing that would disintegrate on impact. Ideally the bomb would use a thermobaric warhead, one that kills via overpressure, as it generates even more powerful blast waves than traditional high-explosive bombs.
Benitez chose the B-1 for his hypothetical scenario not only because of its bomb-carrying capability, but for the same reason the heavy bomber became a close air support platform of choice in Afghanistan: its long range translated into persistence over the battlefield, enabling the big bomber to hang around above friendly forces and bomb the Taliban for hours. The B-1 could do donuts in the skies over a wildfire as firefighters on the ground work out the best way to tackle it. The B-1 wouldn't carry just any bomb, either, but ordinance that was designed for firefighting. Most bombs use a steel casing that fragments into deadly shrapnel, but this would be unnecessary (and dangerous) when fighting fires. A firefighting bomb would use a combustible casing that would disintegrate on impact. Ideally the bomb would use a thermobaric warhead, one that kills via overpressure, as it generates even more powerful blast waves than traditional high-explosive bombs.
Kill everything, kill everything, bomb the living bejesus out of those forests.
Circumcision is child abuse.
On a small fire that has just started, this might work.... but once you've raised the temperature of everything to the point where oxygen supply is the rate limiting factor, I doubt this would work for more than a few minutes.
I'm not a fireman, but this sounds implausible.
An "ordinance designed for firefighting" might be a law banning drones, or something like that. I think the submitter means "ordnance".
Posse Comitatus Act (1878) bans military action (by the army, navy, air force, or marines) within the United States without prior congressional approval. The coast guard and national guard are not covered, though, so that's a back door (and why the coast guard is often involved in no knock raids, etc, that are no where near water).
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Ideally the bomb would use a thermobaric warhead, one that kills via overpressure, as it generates even more powerful blast waves than traditional high-explosive bombs.
A lot of these fires are near habitation. You can't just go dropping bombs anywhere. The Swedes were able to bomb their fire because it was on a bombing range.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Spaaace Fooorce!
Table-ized A.I.
Why not? California does give the US Federal Government more in taxes than any other state, by a lot!
I'm sorry, but there is no significant historical record to accurately reflect any particular reason for a particular set of fires. While you may wish for the reason to be "abnormal climate" there is simply no way to know at the moment.
I.E. Please notice the "Post-2000" heading in this particular Wikipedia article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Have a great day!
Caution: Contents under pressure
They were started by an arsonist. Although being hot and dry for months certainly didn't help.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
I propose new fire suppressing missiles.
--
Only you can prevent forest fires -- S. Bear
Oversimplifying and collectivizing people is what made the annoying orange be the president in first place, and what makes the far left be so fucking lunatic (as is the thing that makes the far right be fucking lunatic as well).
So better start to treat people individually or get plowed by the "exception".
You have to remember that 1% of the US population is still 3.4 million people, and many simplifications made by both sides assume that groups of like 10% don't actually exist.
Wikipedia is illegitimate. "History" isn't required, but even there you are wrong. These fires have a probability of occurring in a given area (based on observed past, i.e. history), and that probability has been elevated due to climate change and that change has been verified by observed increased frequency in wildfires in disparates areas with the same climate. You know, statistical analysis? Time series analysis? Do you know what these words mean?
It's the only way to be sure ...
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
You mean the 500+ wildfires across the entire western US region were started by a single arsonist, or was it a vast "arsonist conspiracy"? Were those same arsonists able to secure air travel on a supersonic jet to travel from California to Portugal several times per day during the 46 C extremes?
Yes, preventing fires is how we got into this mess in the first place. But if we just let the fires burn, then enough will burn at once to cause climate effects. Not so much because of the carbon release (although that is an issue) but because of the loss of forests. So now we're committed to fighting these intense fires, to slow down the rate of loss.
If we're going to use ordnance in relation to forest fires, we should invent tree-planting bombs and/or missiles. Maybe we could create some kind of tree-planting javelin made out of bamboo (for renewability and biodegradability) that could be dropped in immense numbers from these bombers. When it impacts and penetrates, a weighted ring made of stones and glued together with food for the tree slides down the shaft, permitting the tree to push it open at the top. At the bottom, the bamboo helps protect it from wild pigs, which have become problematic across most of the continental US, and Hawaii. The stones condense water at night. The tree food dissolves before the trunk of the tree grows appreciably.
Last time I looked into it, though, even that is worthless. Replanting does little to hasten regrowth, as absurd as that sounds, because nature has already evolved mechanisms for handling that part of the process. What does help is preventing the soil from washing away in the mean time. So maybe we cluster-bomb the land... with soil-retaining nets.
Or maybe the whole idea of fighting fires with weapons is dumb... but the idea of bombing them is definitely dumb.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I was under the impression that forest fires are natural in a healthy forest, and in fact some trees need forest fires to germinate properly (the cones are heavy with resin, the heat of the fire causes the cone to fully mature and then go to seed after the fire has passed.)
Also, by preventing fires the deadwood that would normally be burned accumulates, to the point where when a fire inevitably starts you get a torrentially large fire instead of the typical small fire (of a healthy forest).
And so one way to prevent large forest fires is to frequently start smaller fires, to clear out the accumulating deadwood.
I'm not a forestry expert, so I'm asking the question: has that explanation (and rationale) been disproven?
If it hasn't, is there some reason why smaller "management" fires aren't periodically set?
Is this a California thing?
Even if 8 in 10 were started by people?
https://www.npr.org/sections/t...
Surely that alters the calculus a little?
Why don't we just learn the lesson and ban any construction that would cause us to care about the forest fires?
I've known several people who built very cost effective homes where they just scooped a place out, built the home, and put the dirt over the top. As long as no trees are nearby to fall on it, those would likely survive most of these fires. They may have to leave to avoid suffocation, but their home would be fine when they return.
Rather than fight mother nature, respect her and build with the assumption that the worst will always happen over any significant time span.
If bombs won't win the war against fire, we just need bigger bombs. What Americans wouldn't get behind that logic?
Seriously though, how about razing, and paving or salting strips of land to act as permanent firebreaks? Sure there'd be some vegetation loss due to that, but the reduction in burns would more than make up for it.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
I think people don't quite understand the magnitude of some of these fires. A few years ago I was on the ride out team for a charitable organization that operates a camp in the wilderness. On the day of our fire evacuation, the fire for into an old burn and proceeded to consume some 5000 acres in under 2 hours. The fire sent a plume some 50,000 feet into the air. We were about 6 miles away and the best way I have to describe this is watching a nuclear bomb going off in slow motion. It was the most awe inspiring spectacle I have ever seen.
Anyhow, the only thing that the Airforce could really help with in these situations would be for the Air Mobility Command to turn some of their transport fleet into VLATs (Very Large Air Tankers) to help protect structures and people, and guide the fire. Directly attacking it is futile.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
... once the blast decayed and the oxygen returned to the hot embers?
(That's a rhetorical question.)
Seriously though, how about razing, and paving or salting strips of land to act as permanent firebreaks? Sure there'd be some vegetation loss due to that, but the reduction in burns would more than make up for it.
The problem areas are generally on grades, some of them quite extreme. The costs would be substantial, and salt wouldn't stay where it's supposed to. Big fires jump right over gaps, so you'd have to make very wide gaps to be of any use and even that probably wouldn't help. Perhaps you've heard about the fire tornadoes? Big fires create their own weather. A fire tornado can throw burning coals considerable distances. Firebreaks are of less and less utility.
The best things to do are all things we should have been doing long ago. We are probably too late to do many of them. We could do much more preemptive burning, if we could only hire many more firefighters. We could be building homes which aren't so easy to burn, and burying propane tanks so they don't explode and help spread fires. We could repurpose more military aircraft for firefighting. But we needed to prioritize these things decades ago, and we didn't, and now we're going to reap the whirlwind... the flaming whirlwind.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Fires are natural part of the ecological cycle. Developed countries putting them out early for nearly 100 years is what's causing more fires to occur - the buildup of vegetation (dead and live) means more fuel for new fires. The ecosystem needs fires every now and then to clear out dead brush (release the elements and chemical compounds they contain back into the ecosystem), and clear room for new plant growth (which supports different species than old growth). If you're not gonna let loggers thin out those trees, then you gotta let fires thin them every now and then.
Forest fires happened for hundreds of millions of years before man arrived on the scene, and they never burned the entire Earth to a cinder. Leave them alone to do their thing. If they're threatening buildings, that's a sign that you need to build a bigger firebreak around those buildings. Not a reason to put the fire out.
If we're going to use ordnance in relation to forest fires, we should invent tree-planting bombs and/or missiles
My God, how is this not already modded "+5, Hilarious".
Now that's a real Wrath Of Khan style death as the wave of creation overcomes you!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Trophy homes. While letting it burn would be the best solution in many cases, the rich don't like it. Hence spending millions fighting a fire which shouldn't be fought.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Why not bury the houses while you're at it, the wildfires would pass right over them. Use firebug drones to start controlled burns. Or we could just do nothing, which is the cheapest option.
Houses tend not to be built on extreme grades, we can let the cliffs burn and just make firebreaks on level areas. The edge of the other side is a good place to concentrate fire retardant and extinguishing capacity. Why risk lives and worry about number of firefighters when extinguishing aircraft can be drones? We're half-assing the problem because politicians want to say they're doing something while spending as little as possible, lots of improvements in efficiency and efficacy can be made.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
If you've ever been to a military base, you might have noticed that everybody isn't just sitting on their ass all day. They are doing things. Which shows you that they are allowed to do things, inside the United States.
The Posse Comitatus Act says the Army and Air Force can't be used for domestic *law enforcement*, except as authorized by the Insurrection Act and certain other situations, including enforcing federal law (see Little Rock 1956).
Firefighting isn't law enforcement, so no Posse Comitatus issue here.
Originally it applied only to the Army. Later, the Air Force was added. There is no law applying it to the Navy or Marines, only policies put in place by those services.
Fires are an incredibly important part of the ecosystem. Areas that have forest fires have greater biological diversity, healthier plants, and yes, some seeds even require the heat of a fire in order to germinate. This obsession with stopping all fires at all costs is hurting the environment.
How long before the first ent wedding gets accidently bombed?
You really can't talk meaningfully about trends by examining individual events in isolation.
Climate change is neither necessary nor sufficient for the kinds of fires we are seeing. However, in places prone to wildfires, wildfire is a seasonal phenomenon, and the lengths of fire seasons over the last forty years has increased by 19%, and the area burned in fire seasons has more than doubled. Wildfires are only possible when three factors are present: fuel, ignition sources, and dry weather. While the acreage and number of fires *might conceivably* be due to increased fuel or ignition sources, the lengthened fire season is pretty obviously correlated to prolonged dry seasons.
It's probably meaningless to ask whether anthropogenic climate change "caused" any particular fire or set of local fires, because such fires could happen in a steady state world, or a cooling world. The more narrowly you look in space and time the less meaningful the question is. But the overall global, multi-decade trend to more area burned and longer fire seasons is a different kettle of fish.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
No.... ignorance, stupidity, tribal mentality, and worthless fucking liars...made the orange asshat president.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
For a lot of places that's true. Some places, however, have certain species that have rapid growth (undergrowth) and are very combustible..... those need actual clearing instead of preventive fires, and they need rapid suppression in the case of accidental fires.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
no
long answer:
still no
I would expect this to actually work less effectively the larger the bomb is. The reason is that the force of the bomb is distributed through a spherical volume proportional to its yield, but the fire is spread over a two-dimensional surface. So area of a given level of destruction goes up as the 2/3 power of yield.
This is why gigantic bombs are largely impractical. In most cases they're less effective than a equivalent weight of smaller bombs. MOAB weighs as much as 43 Mark 82 500 pound bombs; it has as much H6 as 97 Mark 82s, but destroys an area equivalent to 21 Mark 82s.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Election fraud and foreign interference is what made the degenerate president.
What's the narrative today, there is no election fraud and therefore voter ID laws aren't needed or election fraud gave Trump the Whitehouse?
All they had to do was convince 304 people that voting for Trump was better than getting dosed with novichok. That's it. Just 304 people made Trump president.
Ahh, a new slanderous angle. Surely someone as moral and truthful as yourself has extraordinary evidence to backup that extraordinary claim. Let's see it.
The person calling someone an idiot is a shameless outright liar with a political agenda, big surprise. (No, California doesn't have a shortage of firefighting water like you read on twitter either.)
I see the controlled burn notices and the plumes of smoke every spring, and they've been increasing in frequency in recent years as the fire danger has grown. Here's a source from 9 months ago noting that California's controlled burns have doubled in the past 3 years and is now 31 square miles of controlled burns a year: https://weather.com/en-CA/cana...
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It's fairly easy to protect major cities from forest fires with such tactics, and for the most part we're successful at that -- with the occasional spectacular failure like Fort McMurray. It's nowhere near as easy to protect thousands of little mountainous villages of 10 houses each... and they add up to a whole lot of people, people who will not move to a city voluntarily.
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Let's research how to make better fire-fighting foam. The foam would be cheap, easy to apply (ex: wouldn't get clogged up in hoses), and wouldn't mess up the environment.
And there should be two options of how to package the foam:
1) The standard, self-contained way to package it, which I guess uses an aerosol spray to shoot the foam out of the container. This way is simple, but when you transport the foam to the fire, you have to carry the water that's in the foam.
2) A dry foam powder, which mixes with water fast and easily. So you would carry the dry powder to the fire, and combine the powder with a local water supply, such as a river or a water pipe. Then you'd shoot the water/powder combination at the flammable bushes or whatever, and it would expand into foam when it hit the open air. Something like that. This way is more complicated, but you don't have to transport the water.
the far left
There is no far left to speak of in the US. There isn't even a left, nor is there a center. There is only right (D) and extreme right (R).
I understand that it may be difficult to see this when you sat inside it all, but objectively, relative to a global context, there is no political left with any say whatsoever in the US.
There are some centrist voices trying to be heard, now and then, but they have no clout, as of now. Actual left? No.
Perspective.
Police and other government services love getting powerful military hardware. If this really were to work, we wouldn't end up with the military dropping bombs on forest fires, we'd end up with fire departments owning bombers, plus the creeps who get a kick out of having that much power and destruction at their fingertips. And we end up footing the bill.
These jets and chemical explosions would just produce more CO2 on massive scale. What was the root cause of these calamities in the first place.
I suppose they have got enough bombs now to nuke everything on the planet.
Eucalypts. They have lots of oil in their leaves and burn really hot. Our gift to America...
For many species the seeds will only germinate after a fire. So regular fires keep them going in the longer term.
Our gift to America, burn very well due to their oil.
Just to be sure.
It's the one time it really fits and is on topic.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Seriously, our forests are loaded with dead trees due to beetle kill. Start harvesting the heck out of them and replant. This is much cheaper than bombing.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Concussion bombs could be a fast way of containing a wildfire, but are any currently available military bombs suitable for this application? The MOAB is an effective large airburst weapon, but they cost $16 million each and the USAF has a total of about twenty in inventory. We may be better off developing a special low-cost airburst device specifically for the job. These could be stored on military bases near fire-prone areas.
Yes, the military high explosives do leave residues at a very low level. Tests of this (where they explode munitions in piles of snow) show that "on average, 99.997% or more of the RDX and TNT was consumed" (used Sci-Hub to read). So a few grams of a mildly toxic material that breaks down fairly quickly in low concentrations. UXOs would simply be disarmed and removed since these are precision bombing operations though know exactly where they are.
The fire retardant that is used in fire bombing is Phos-Chek. Which consists of "include ammonium polyphosphate, diammonium phosphate, diammonium sulfate, monoammonium phosphate, attapulgus clay, guar gum (or a derivative of guar gum), and trade secret performance additives". The Phos-Chek is dyed red in part with iron oxide. the ammonium phosphate fertilizers are used in ABC fire extinguishers as well.
And in this report we read: "Fire suppression chemicals have minor toxicological or ecological effects and, as a result, do not generally harm terrestrial ecosystems. Major impacts, suppression chemicals have on the environment, may be through the adverse effects on water quality, and subsequently to aquatic ecosystems. Retardants may encourage eutrophication and, in some cases, contribute to fish kill when applied on watersheds, or if accidentally applied directly to water bodies."
About what you'd expect from spreading fertilizer.
Second class citizen of the New Gilded Age
"Why not bury the houses while you're at it, the wildfires would pass right over them."
That may be a viable solution in some cases. But people like windows.
"Houses tend not to be built on extreme grades, "
It doesn't take much of one to make those solutions unworkable. It doesn't take much of a hill to give fire a boost. Fire likes to go up hills. People like to live on hills to get views.
"Why risk lives and worry about number of firefighters when extinguishing aircraft can be drones?"
It takes large aircraft to fight fires, and we are hesitant to put those under computer control and then send them over populated areas. It takes action on the ground to fight fires with any kind of precision. If you were to rely solely on bombs then only when fires were already large could you hope to extinguish them without doing as much damage as the fire.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Eucalyptus isn't everywhere, though to somebody whose experience is limited to a coastal urban and agricultural landscape it may seem like it. And yes, certain varieties do burn like gasoline. Dealing with such a fire is oriented toward controlling its spread and protecting what might be nearby while the fire burns itself out, which generally happens fairly quickly.
Most California forests don't contain much if any eucalyptus, but do have trees that are small-fire-adapted. Big, very hot fires cause major, long-term changes in the forest, much like clear-cutting.
Controlled burns are done, but only in areas where there is little exposure of private property. Considerable preliminary work is needed to thin the trees and large underbrush, and establish control lines, before burning - the burning mostly clears the grass and low brush. Because of all the work that's needed, it doesn't get done often - most likely to find it in national parks and conservancy-managed land. National forests don't have the budget to do any significant amount of thinning and controlled burning.
"Thinning" is not the same thing as clear-cutting or "managing for maximum cut." There is a large amount of distrust of federal land managers because of political and management pressure for the latter under the guise of the former - a distrust that is historically justified.
Gatorade all what plants need.
...everything looks like a nail
Nuffsaid
________
Don't know about his cat, but Schroedinger is definitely dead.
Not really. The natives used to set fires every year in northern California. This worked great. There were redwoods from point sur to Canada, and healthy oak forests inland of that. They moved around, so this worked for them. Then white people showed up and started building homes and towns in the middle of these forests, and passed laws preventing setting those fires, and that's how we got where we are today.
Where is that? Well, because of those habitations we cannot tolerate uncontrolled burns, so we use controlled burns. Problem is, we don't have enough personnel to have enough of those to actually control the problem. We also don't have enough budget to have more personnel and equipment, and even if we did, there's a limit to how fast we could train people.
One solution might be to just stop protecting homes, in favor of uncontrolled burns. Any homes which are in danger of burning would be constructed to burn without consequence for any who do not live there, and make getting out with one's valuables the exclusive responsibility of the residents. Until we have the technology to manage undergrowth without fire, we need to live in expectation of its occurrence. Maybe robotics will eventually produce cost-effective clearer/chipper machines which can do the job, although that sounds like a horror movie waiting to happen.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I've long thought aerial CO2 bombs would be helpful...except for the squirrels.
It's the only way.
I can't wait until we do this on burning suburbs too.
Or better yet the parl...
I'm all for the Air Force bombing California. Bomb everything that causes the problems related to the wild fires. They should start with Sacramento and work their way out from there.
"Oversimplifying and collectivizing people is what made the annoying orange be the president in first place, and what makes the far left be so fucking lunatic (as is the thing that makes the far right be fucking lunatic as well)."
You mean over simplifying like you are doing right here in your post? The US is the least collectivized of Western nations. Blaming any small increase in collectivization in this country we might have had in the last couple of decades for our current president or for current political extremism is preposterous as well.
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No!
Forest fires are yet another beautiful part of nature.
As are trees.
Both should be allowed to grow, unchecked. What could go wrong?
The air force happens to be equipped with a bunch of planes specifically designed to carry large loads to be dropped, accurately, on targets.
The use of high explosives to snuff out fires is obviously problematic and probably not practical in all but the most remote and/or desperate situations.
But I don't see why the use of the planes with "bomb" loads that are designed to spread flame retardant or extinguishing chemicals would be at all controversial. The only real question is whether we have a bomb technology capable of working as a dispersal technology and not just an explosive.
B1s or B52s can dump massive payloads pretty accurately and the air force has the logistics to turn these around quickly, too, amplifying the potential effectiveness. A B-1B has a payload 25% higher than a DC-10 converted to tanker capability and probably a lot better low level handling capability. Plus there's a whole lot more B-1Bs than DC-10 tankers. Hitting a fire's leading edge with 5 planes in rapid succession is probably worth more than 5 DC-10 loads spread over hours.
My guess is that we probably do have some dusty old designs from the chemical and biological warfare eras that could be adapted for use with retardant or extinguishing materials. Clearly if we once had a way to spread VX or anthrax or whatever with bombers, we could probably figure out a way to bomb fires with flame retardant that didn't involve blowing up whatever's on the ground.
It also seems like the kind of technology the military itself would find useful. The Japanese tried to use balloons to set forest fires during WW II, and it seems reasonable the military would gain some value in a "bomb" technology that would let them fight fires using their existing bomber fleet.
All the other arguments about forest fires seem a distraction -- should we or shouldn't we put them out, should people build in fire-prone areas or not, etc. Once we've decided we shouldn't allow some area to burn, then its really about how do you control the fire if conventional methods and equipment don't seem up to the task.
I bet somebody from the US Forest service is calling somebody at NOAA asking "So...how did you guys finally deal with people asking you to take care of hurricanes with Nuclear weapons?"
Eucalypts. They have lots of oil in their leaves and burn really hot. Our gift to America...
More like Californians' idiotic gift to themselves; eucalypts were brought to California during the Gold Rush as a way to satisfy the demand for lumber with the fast-growing Australian trees. Then the tycoons who'd planted vast acreages of eucalypts discovered that, while the 75-100 year old trees in Australia provided good timber, the young trees they were growing didn't, being irregular in grain as well as cracking and shrinking when dried. The wood didn't even make good railroad ties or fence posts. Even the oil was poorer quality than what Australia produced, and the trees were increasingly sold for fuel until cheaper electricity and gas wiped out that market.
I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
Firefighters with TBI. Do not want.
Seriously, ground crews work too close to water drop zones for this to be safe with explosives. The procedures needed to clear the area and verify that personnel were at a safe distance would take too long. People can't move quickly through dense forests. So this would really only be useful for inaccessible terrain.
Have gnu, will travel.
Worked in Dresden. ...or did it....
5 out of 6 people enjoy Russian Roulette & 6 out of 7 Dwarfs are not Happy
A note - during the Vietnam war, fire base hill tops were cleared by dropping large fuel bladders which broke open; the resulting fuel-air mixture was then detonated.
The problem in US is that the collectivization did hit the political party that was opposing Trump.
When something that dumb hit the powerful people, the damage is quite very big.
I have no idea what you're trying to convey here. Hopefully English is your second language so you have a solid excuse for your incoherencey.
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These large wild fires happen several times a year. I believe there are 3 major ones now in CA and several smaller ones. That 31 square miles is tiny, there is a WMA not far from my lake property it is about 67 square miles and gets regular controlled burns. Even the large county park near me has started doing controlled burns over its 4 square mile area. They ran some big brush hogs through the woods several years ago and have been having controlled burns since in the woods and as part of an ongoing prairie restoration project.
Time to offend someone
It would need testing. It could blow out a fire but the fire might re-ignite anyway because of many superheated cores well beyond fire starting temps.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Send the Air Force out to carpet-bomb all the national forests. Once there aren't any trees, the wildfire problem will be solved for good. This will be good for the economy of companies that make bombs, and will probably cost less than the wall. This will also let Air Force pilots rack up "combat" flight time and pad their salaries. And finally, it shows the trees and wildlife who's boss in America.
If the Air Force can get to bomb forest fires, then the Army should be allowed to shoot down thunderstorms.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
Wildfires are only possible when three factors are present: fuel, ignition sources, and dry weather.
You neglected a detail: the fuel is only present after a sufficiency of wet weather. Without wet weather, the vegetation doesn't grow enough to become a fire hazard when it dries out.
Yes, but that does nothing with respect to fire season *length*, which is what makes that an interesting metric.
Anyhow you get both under AGW models: more intense rainy seasons and longer dry seasons.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
In Germany there's a saying. shooting sparrows with cannon balls.
It may work, but it's like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
There were large tracts of Bowater paper mill trees all across Tennessee; They were all killed out by native beetles, and they left them standing until they fell, because they weren't good for anything.
If you can't use them for paper, wtf can you use them for? :)
IIRC, the land was sold off, and not replanted.
Native stuff is growing there now.
Truth isn't Truth - Guliani
I wonder if a sonic boom from an airplane flying trans sonic 100 feet off the deck would generate enough over pressure to blow out a fire?
There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.
but why do I picture it pushing the flames further out making the fire much larger.
Clear cutting is likely the best answer especially if you don't think Global Warming is a hoax. A zig-zag pattern would be visible from the air, but not too noticeable from ground level. This year alone, California will put more CO2 in the atmosphere than all of our cars and coal plants combined. The feds insisting that fed land fires be allowed to burn out is dirt dumb. Zig-zag clear cutting would not need to cost a dime. Sell the trees from the feld area and make money, lumber would get cheaper and we wouldn't have to import most of our forest products from Canada.
Care to explain to me how it is that I own an apartment in Stockholm, which I'm about to sell for roughly double what I paid for it?
(Yes, I'll have to pay tax on the gain, but I'd have to do the same if I sold a home at a profit in the US.)
Not if it's your only home... your homestead capital gains are typically not taxable in the US.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
To be fair, California receives federal spending dollars more than any other State, by a lot.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway