Grand Canyon Lodge North Rim, Dragon Bravo expansion

[azbackpackr]

(July 27 Edit, changed headline to reflect development of fire.)
Grand Canyon Lodge at North Rim burned last night, and over the last 24 hours also the visitor center, cabins, Administration center, backpacking permit office, and numerous employee houses were burned. I heard that the mules survived and that nobody died. It'll be all over the news.
https://inciweb.wildfire.gov/incident-i ... bravo-fire

[xsproutx]

Right, and I looked at those and didn't see anything preventing natural fires from burning so I was curious if I was missing a subsection/amendment/etc. Originally, that was an unofficial policy but that all changed with the leopold report is my understanding, which is why I was looking for a real citation. Yellowstone plus 40+ National Parks have deviations so when it's the majority, is it really a deviation?
Again, more curiosity than anything as it would be a weird strategy these days. Wouldn't be the first time the government falls behind but when I see something I know isn't factual, I like to know if something's changed or been updated. You seem to have pretty specific knowledge so thought you could provide the language easy enough

[Jim]

I see people are more interested in the direction of those gusty winds, and not that there were gusty winds, whereas I was mostly laughing at gusty winds being called uncommon for the area. Sure, you can make an argument about the direction and the time of year. Even though the inciweb source didn't make any statements about the timing. After all, gusty northwest winds are pretty common in fall, winter, and early spring.

the Dragon Bravo Fire was driven by strong northwest wind gusts, uncommon to the area, and jumped multiple containment features

https://inciweb.wildfire.gov/incident-i ... bravo-fire

Yes, the westerlies tend to give way to a south or southeast wind in monsoon season. Given that thunderstorms occur this time of year, and they can produce gusty erratic winds, if erratic outflow winds took place, then there still could have been an outcome similar to this one, possibly identical to the thread title. A thunderstorm to the NW of the fire, and with favorable dynamics, could easily have produced unpredictable erratic and mostly NW winds, sometimes at very high speeds, which could have caused multiple line failures. Doesn't really change much, or stop me from laughing at them saying gusty winds are uncommon to the area, NW or from any direction. Were gusty winds uncommon near Utah in the other fire that basically no one is talking about? Has something happened to northern Arizona since I moved away in 2012 and gusty winds are now no longer a thing, ever? Man, was my timing off when I lived there!

Oddly, a NW wind suggests that there was no monsoon flow, and typically NW winds are predictable, often days in advance. So, common or not to a given area, if there was an advance prediction, what happened? Erratic thunderstorm winds are not usually predicted, at least. We need more information, information we may not actually get, but this is very reminiscent of the Texas Floods. At least Hobbs isn't playing Abbott calling it the actions of losers to have an investigation.

For anyone interested in Prescribed Fire vs Controlled Burn, it seems the talk section of the Wikipedia article has a 2006 entry that basically suggests people don't know the difference and will look for controlled burn, so the name of the article should be the old out of date controlled burn instead of prescribed fire, because that would add an extra step. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Controlled_burn

What is a controlled burn?

Simply put, a controlled burn is a planned low-intensity fire that is often used to prevent uncontrolled wildfires from overwhelming a forest landscape by removing hazardous fuels such as low growing vegetation.

https://www.americanforests.org/article ... led-burns/

I don't know who that organization is, but I have not seen anyone refer to prescribed fire as controlled in a long time. At least, no one in fire that I have known does. All it does is make the public angry when a prescribed fire escapes the planned area, as does happen from time to time. "It was a controlled fire!!!" What exactly does that mean? Basically, nothing, as there is almost no control when you have an active fire. You are simply burning under prescribed conditions.

The term was changed to Prescribed, at least in the a-political world, because a prescribed area has a prescription to burn in specific parameters. There is no actual control of the fire. You don't pull a level and get more fire or less, the way you sort of can to alter a planned flood down stream of a dam.

There was a short lived term that seems to have died long ago of, "wildland use fire", which was meant to cover wildfire that was being used to burn a given area. That went away a while ago, and managed fire seems to have replaced it. At least, managed fire has some semblance of simply being a fire which is being managed, as opposed to strictly being suppressed. Still, people call something controlled, and that often makes people think prescribed, even if it was not. At least as recently as 2006 (which is getting to be 2 decades ago) those terms were virtually synonymous.

[corwinwilkins]

Sounds like it's easy to bitch about things when you aren't the boots on the ground. What I know is those men and women trying to manage that fire did and are doing their best. Once there was airborne chlorine it gets dicey.

Chlorine gas can be lethal at concentrations around 400 ppm and above, with fatalities possible within 30 minutes at these levels. Lower concentrations can cause severe respiratory distress and potentially fatal poisoning with prolonged or chronic exposure.

Here's a more detailed breakdown:
1-3 ppm: Mild irritation of the respiratory tract, skin, or eyes.
5-15 ppm: Moderate irritation.
30 ppm: Severe respiratory distress.
400-1000 ppm: Lethal within 30 minutes to an hour.
10 ppm: Immediately dangerous to life or health.

So if there is even a chance of a pocket of chlorine gas around you pull your people out. Full stop. Makes fighting the fire even harder.

The Lodge was burnt down in the 30's and rebuilt. This one can be too. I'm just hoping that the fire is controlled and no one gets hurt.

[outdoor_lover]

I doubt I will ever go back there.

Wait, what? In about 75 years it will be the go to place for Aspen! There won't be any Kaibab Squirrels left unless they close everything off until they have repopulated, but that's ok. It's going to be decades before it becomes a destination again anyway. I can't even imagine that under current conditions they can even begin to rebuild unless some billionaire steps forward and pays for it all.

[azbackpackr]

@outdoor_lover
Ohhh, can't wait for the casino, water park, zip lines, gondola, roller coaster, and go cart track! The casino will be lit up in a way to provide a light show for people looking across from the South Rim.

[Jim]

Will any of us even be around in 75 years to enjoy these casinos and laser light shows?

[Jim]

@corwinwilkins
Any idea why it leaked in large quantities?

It is a powerful oxidizer and will support a fire almost as efficiently as oxygen.

https://www.fireengineering.com/fire-sa ... chemicals/

Water systems using chlorine in similar fashion to a swimming pool, it sounds like fire may not have reached the part of the water facility where chlorine (in tablet or liquid form) was entering the water, which might have been cooled anyway and therefore had no leak. It sounds like perhaps liquid chlorine was stored and hot gasses from adjacent fire contacted the chlorine causing the gas to accelerate the fire and release the leak. That or a shed storing tablets burned?

I'm only familiar with chlorine in my pool, which was miserable to manage in a shed. We used large 4 inch tabs to stock the pool filter, which slowly dissolved into the water. It sounds more like the water facility used a liquid form, which is probably faster and easier to control for dissolving for a drinking water system.

[hikeaz]

Seems that in the 9/10 DAYS between the start of the fire and the Lodge burning, that a large portion if not all of the chlorine could have been moved off-site "as a precautionary measure" as they say. The GCNP has water disruptions all the time.. it's not an anomaly, folks are almost growing to expect it. So, not much downside but the upside is an intact Lodge.

[Jim]

Well, I don't know where the water plant is in relation to the lodge, but I don't think the chlorine gas has anything to do with the lodge burning. Not directly, at least. Maybe it would have allowed people to remain in the area? I don't know that the NPS is capable of moving it, either. A vendor may not have been able to get there. Perhaps, like a propane tank, the delivery system isn't designed to remove propane from the house tanks, so any liquid chlorine (assuming it was) wasn't able to be, either. I've never heard of propane being pumped out of a residential tank.

I think, more logical, a team should have been assigned to create a buffer around anything like chlorine so that a fire wouldn't reach it. In reality, that should always be present in the form of "defensible space". If that wasn't present, why wasn't it?

I am curious where the plant is, as nothing obvious appears in satellite images, and the tanks I can see are near the N Rim EMS and Helipad sites.

I'm actually impressed the lodge was able to burn from how far south it was on a peninsula of rock. If a report is ever made public, I hope we can learn if fire blew in on the ground, or if the lodge burned from embers landing on the roof and igniting the building. This would be similar to how long range spotting occurred in the Palisades Fire in the LA area this past January.

A wood roof is never "firewise". The available google images of the lodge show a wood roof, and wood eves and overhangs that could allow for ground fire to send embers into any vents, if fire was on the ground in the scrub oak. Also, not firewise. I see dense scrub oak right up to the building, which is not defensible space.

That can burn upslope and send fire right into the building, basically. Especially if live fuel moisture is low, which it probably was.

BTW, on a positive note, Inspecting google street for that peninsula, the area might look really nice in a year. Just looking in the campground, I see huge old pines, and a very open forest with the only real obvious issue being the duff build-up. No one ever seems to do this, but a yearly or bi-yearly raking of duff and old cones could remove a lot of the danger in the camp ground. Crown scorch should be minimal in the areas I observed, but there could be girdling if the duff was deep enough.

Jason's tweet was actually interesting, since he alludes to what I thought from the article post yesterday, and he mentions a lack of resources. He wrote,

"damn anyone that says this was prescribed"

, so, it seems the "controlled burn" term being carelessly tossed around did lead to confusion somewhere. He also wrote,

we were about to contain it by burning off the roads but lost our resources to the White Sage fire and didn't have enough personnel

.

There is a lot that will probably come to light. We don't know specifics about resources. I saw somewhere that tankers were in Alaska, which has nothing to do with the White Sage. However, f they didn't have people to do anything, that is another matter.

I remember this: [ USFS will fire roughly 3,400 federal employees ]
Now, the intent was not to reduce fire personnel, but one has to ask how many young naive people tolerated or enjoyed a few seasons of fire hoping to get a career that was not fire later on? That is speculation, but I know that it's hard dirty work, and people may now not bother if there is no reward. Would the current CEO of the Society of America Foresters be where he is if he had not been an Apalachicola Hot Shot in 2000? No, I know for a fact, he would not.

[Alston_Neal]

@azbackpackr
I can see it now....Mar del Gran Cañón

[xsproutx]

water park, zip lines, gondola, roller coaster,

Look. I understand why we wouldn't these things in a park but if there was ever a roller coaster or zipline that went from the top of the rim to the bottom, I'd be first in line. I'd just want it separated from the other stuff and not visible.

[chumley]

For those who may not be following the GCNP news releases or their socials, they posted a full structure assessment yesterday that may be of interest. They emphasized that the map was accurate on 7/13 and that the fire is ongoing and uncontained and structures that have not been damaged or destroyed are still at risk.

[corwinwilkins]

@Jim
If I had to guess, they were using IBC tanks for storage and the HDPE type have a melting point around 130 degree C, ( 226 F). Easy for a fire to compromise.

But only a guess.

[xsproutx]

@corwinwilkins

IBC type totes can certainly be used to store liquid chlorine. Unlike propane, it has a pretty short shelf life and is constantly degrading and degrades pretty fast, so there is more of an emphasis on portability/replacement than something like propane that doesn't really degrade.
Due to that, for large scale water treatment like this, you usually use chlorine in gas format. The half life is way longer, it's much less destructive to the the delivery mechanisms, and it's more concentrated so takes up less space. All great benefits if you're using it in a long term predictable manner. I use liquid chlorine in my pool but only keep enough in the house to get me through a month as you start seeing noticeable degradation in the summer months here in phoenix.
I'm not sure about what the NPS is doing specifically but yeh, normally anything with volume is using gas vs liquid and is typically pumped into tanks similar to propane and can't be removed easily.

[Jim]

@xsproutx
From what I read, it can be both, but many water treatment facilities are moving from gas to liquid forms over safety concerns. Sounds like this may have been a gas form leak, and not a liquid solution of what basically is bleach. Maybe the gas was a high pressure liquid form of chlorine, like propane that is liquified under pressure, but gas at normal atmospheric pressures?

Also, if you search for a chlorine gas leak at GCNP you should get returns about a leak in January of this year, so it seems to be something that happens there a lot. I guess high winds are out on the plateau, and gas leaks are in! Fashion is tough.
https://www.nps.gov/grca/learn/news/chl ... y-2025.htm

[shelby147]

Also, if you search for a chlorine gas leak at GCNP you should get returns about a leak in January of this year, so it seems to be something that happens there a lot.

As far as I know, the leak this January was the first time it had happened. It is not normal. They are replacing the water pipeline and I believe the January leak was related to that.

[Grimey]

I guess they're taking advantage of the North Rim closure and are just going to let the fire burn straight up 67. Should make for a nice scenic drive consisting of miles of burned forest, should they decide to reopen the North Rim someday.

/s

[shelby147]

@Grimey
67 is useful as a firebreak and they're trying to keep the fire west of the hwy. And actually, it could make a quite scenic drive - aspen frequently grow after fires destroy the canopy.

These forests are historically adapted to fire; it is a normal part of the ecosystem. Look at the fire history map for the past 25 years! In ponderosa forests, fires typically burn on the forest floor, reducing fuels and leaving mature pines unharmed. We're seeing more intense fires now thanks to a century of fire suppression and fuel buildup and a warming climate. That is to say, the north rim forest is not being destroyed wholesale by this fire.

Here's an interesting article talking about how this situation exploded out of control. Some firefighting resources had been diverted for the White Sage Fire. When a crew was trapped on the helipad, they feared for their lives. Thank goodness no one died!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... bravo-fire

[Jim]

@shelby147
Where did you find that map? I like it.

Just in general:

Ongoing & Planned Operations: Firefighters plan to build fireline along Forest Road 610 on the northeastern side of the fire.

https://inciweb.wildfire.gov/incident-i ... bravo-fire

Both maps generated using the 24 hour setting.
https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/us ... .26,11.00z

Don't worry, it won't burn all the way up AZ 67. That's National Forest, not Park Service.

Interesting photos on their flickr. The provided link through inciweb didn't work, so I found it and am linking to the NPS stream.


Looks a bit more like there was long range spotting that dropped embers onto the lodge and buildings. You can't really tell 100% from photos, but I see a lot of leaves in the brush and trees around the lodge, which makes me think fire dropped onto the lodge as opposed to blowing up into the lodge. You see it in the junipers and pinyon on that south side near the old dining room and patio. Could be wrong, it's just what I think based on the photos on the SW aspect.

[FOTG]

At this point they need to do those owners of Jacob’s Lake a favor and just push both fires that way and let them collect some insurance. That place is going to shrivel up and die anyways now. I am curious to know when the north rim will even open again, in any capacity? Three to five years for the appearance of facilities again? Access by next summer? Next Fall? All of that seems a little quick for the feds. Or are we going to see Porta Johns at the rim for the next decade, along with a free pair of clippers when you enter so you can cut a path through the locust to get a view? All of a sudden, that Burnt Corral Vegetation Management Project is not looking so bad now.