Woodbury Fire - Superstition Wilderness

[chumley]

Burning near Woodbury Trailhead. It has grown to 500 acres. I'll post official links as soon as they're up.

The smoke plume does not look good.

Inciweb

Updated 2019-07-16 123,875 Acres - 100% Contained
[ Woodbury Fire Perimeter :: map ]

[chumley]

Flood prone areas are still closed, including Fish Creek.

See Forest Order Here: https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DO ... 646864.pdf

[chumley]

Flash flood warning in the Superstitions. Today and tomorrow might cause more damage there than the entire month it was on fire.

[CannondaleKid]

@chumley
Radar for last few hours looked like a ton of rain hit the Supes. Just noted a weather station in AJ at the foot of the Supes already at 2.54" for this morning.
In east Mesa we're already at 1.25" since 3 am.
Nice for us... not so much for flash flooding & erosion in the Supes.

[wildwesthikes]

I was at LaBarge Spring a couple days ago. There is a bit of undercutting going on along the wall of the high bank immediately below the spring, indicating that floods have swept the area recently. I could distinctly smell what can only be described as "wet ash" when walking across the drainage, accompanied by fine grey sooty mud.

[FOTG]

@chumley

might cause more damage

Does it even matter at this point?

[chumley]

@friendofThundergod Yes. A lot.

How the area recovers... if it starts to come back in a few years... rather than a few decades... will depend on what happens to the soil/ash.

[chumley]

looked like a ton of rain hit the Supes

Yes, according to the HAZ map, it's rained somewhere between orange much and red much, surrounded by a lot of yellow much.

[chumley]

4.21" at the North Reavis TH
3.39" at Tortilla TH

Fish Creek -- otherwise untouched by fire -- might be destroyed by runoff from that kind of rainfall.

[Sredfield]

Drove home from Pine this morning, water running in Sycamore Creek and Mesquite Wash, and it looked pretty dark over the Supes.

Also, saw two rollovers, one being cleaned up the other looked rather fresh. We AZ folk don't drive well in the rain.

[Sredfield]

@chumley
That will leave a scar! Over 4 inches would rearrange things regardless of the fire.

[nonot]

@chumley
Geology happens.

[Sredfield]

@nonot
. . . and geologic time includes now.

[FOTG]

My friend climbed Weavers yesterday and snapped this pic of a ton of slurry still lingering on Malapais.

[CannondaleKid]

@friendofThundergod
Over the years I've hiked through areas showing plenty of evidence of slurry almost a decade after the drop. So, depending on conditions it may linger for quite some time.

[AZLumberjack]

It looks slightly unsightly but obviously it worked. Anybody know what happens to wildlife that eats plants soaked with the retardant?

[Tough_Boots]

@AZLumberjack
I would guess an animal needs to be pretty desperate to eat it-- it's full of ammonia. Though I know it decimates fish populations so I would drink any water in the Supes for a while. Maybe springs are fine-- but I'd stay away from filtering runoff.

[outdoor_lover]

Hopefully the big Storm this next week will maybe help rinse some of it away.

[chumley]

If the 5" storm that washed out SR 88 didn't rinse it away, I'm not expecting it to disappear next week.

[Jim]

I was observing red stain from the stuff used in the 2006 Brinns Fire on Wilson Mountain outside of Sedona in 2010 or 11, and while I haven't been back since I moved out to Kayenta, there's a chance it still remains on rocks and tree bark.

[wildwesthikes]

It's hard to tell when the vegetation is covered in black carbonized ash. I'm curious about the environmental impact of the pink stuff myself and whether there is any risk to human or animal health. If it contains a lot of ammonia then yeah that's not great and I'd never considered possible runoff into pools which may eventually be scooped up by backpackers like myself. I doubt a Sawyer Squeeze removes it; might be time to switch back to something with an activated charcoal element.

I didn't notice pink on any of the unburned or burned vegetation above Whiskey Spring Canyon or LaBarge near Bluff - despite it covering the surrounding rocks, but I have a hard time believing it just vanishes. Weathering form rain on slick-rock will most certainly allow it to settle into pools.

I made a long trip video about a week ago that's on youtube showing all that, so maybe someone else with the time to watch it might be able to discern what I was not able to. I'd put a link in here but I'm afraid it would get removed (set me straight on this policy someone?)... If you search "WildWestHikes" on Youtube and go to the superstition wilderness video dated November 2019, skip to about 10 minutes in and you'll see what I'm talking about.