Wildfire Wednesdays #179: Red Flag Warnings, Fire Restrictions, and Burn Bans Explained

Happy Wednesday Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition!

When weather conditions turn hot, dry, and windy, the risk of a single spark igniting a wildfire increases dramatically. During these periods of elevated fire danger, fire professionals and land management agencies rely on several tools to inform the public about the risk and outline actions that can help prevent human-caused fires. Terms like Red Flag Warning, stage restrictions, and burn bans are being used more frequently as prolonged drought, dry fuels, and extreme weather become more common. Earlier this month, parts of the Cibola National Forest and National Grasslands implemented Stage II fire restrictions, highlighting how quickly conditions can shift across the region. While these terms are often used together, they serve different purposes.

Below, we break down what each designation means, how they are determined, and the types of restrictions or precautions that may accompany each notice. By knowing why these measures are implemented, communities can make safer decisions, follow local regulations, and help reduce the risk of human-caused wildfires during periods of elevated fire danger.

This Wildfire Wednesday features:

All the best,
Megan

Red Flag Warnings

What is a Red Flag Warning?

The origin of the name, Red Flag Warning, is a literal one, according to Tamara Wall of the Desert Research Institute: “If there was… high fire danger, local fire stations would go and run a red flag up the flagpole. It was a very visual, kind of pre-mass communications way to signal to people in the area that it was a high-danger day” (NPR, 4/14/23).

According to the National Weather Service (NWS), which issues these alerts in conjunction with local and state agencies, a Red Flag Warning is part of a weather forecast which indicates a local increase in fire danger risk in the next 12 to 24 hours. This increased risk is due to a combination of critical fuel conditions and critical weather conditions (warm temperatures, very low humidities, and strong winds). This means that if a wildfire starts, the conditions are right for it to spread rapidly and be difficult to contain.

This combination of 1. low relative humidity (RH), 2. strong surface wind, 3. unstable air (an incoming or outgoing storm system that creates a significant temperature differential between the land surface and lower atmosphere), and 4. drought creates critical fire weather (NWCG, Critical Fire Weather). When it comes to issuing a Red Flag Warning, primary criteria include relative humidity of 15% or less combined with sustained surface winds, or frequent gusts, of 25 mph or greater. Both conditions must occur simultaneously for at least 3 hours out of a 12-hour period, according to the National Weather Service. Meteorologists also consider how all forecasted weather elements combine to create hazardous conditions (e.g. moderate humidity combined with high temperatures and high winds), even if they don’t fit the humidity and wind criteria individually.

When you see a Red Flag Warning, it means that critical fire weather is currently or will soon be occurring. Red Flag Warnings differ in timing from a fire weather watch, which is a longer-term forecast that warns of the possible development of Red Flag conditions in the next 72 hours. Fire Weather Watches may be issued with meteorologists forecasting up to 8 days in advance, whereas Red Flag Warnings are only issued when the critical fire weather conditions meeting the criteria for these Warnings are expected to begin in the next 12-24 hours.

The alert announcing a Red Flag Warning, whether online, on the news, or on your weather app, will usually indicate for how long the Red Flag Warning is forecasted to last. Fire management personnel take Red Flag Warnings into account and may respond by changing staffing numbers or preemptively moving resources into a certain region to be prepared for a potential ignition. During extended periods of high risk, local authorities may consider policy decisions like banning campfires or closing specific areas.

How to Respond

Adjust your behaviors accordingly to avoid creating a spark that could ignite a larger fire.

  • DO NOT burn debris piles.

  • If you are allowed to burn in burn barrels in your area, cover them with a weighted metal cover.

  • DO NOT throw cigarettes or matches on the ground or out of a moving vehicle.

  • If outdoor fires are allowed, make sure to extinguish them properly. Drown fires and charcoal with plenty of water and stir with a shovel to make sure everything is cold to the touch with bare skin.

    • Never leave a fire or barbeque unattended. Sparks or embers can blow into leaves or grass, ignite a fire, and quickly spread.

  • Avoid parking a recently driven vehicle on dry grass or other areas with vegetative cover.

  • Ensure that no chains or hanging metal are dragging from your vehicle or tow-behind trailer which could cause a spark.

Fire Restrictions

What are fire restrictions?

In the U.S., fire stage restrictions are a set of regulations that come in three tiers to limit activities and possibly even access to segments of public land (e.g., a national forest or ranger district) during periods of high fire risk. Fire restrictions are put in place by land managers to reduce the risk of human-caused wildfire ignitions during periods of high fire danger and severe weather conditions. The decision to implement fire restrictions is based on various factors, including the availability of firefighting resources, current drought conditions, weather forecast, and fuel moisture levels. On national forests, managers may consider implementing restrictions if at least three of the following conditions are present: (1) 1,000 hour fuel content is in the 90th percentile or above; (2) three-day mean energy release component (a measure within the NFDRS that determines potential heat that could be released if fuel was burned, indicating a fire might be hotter and harder to suppress) is at the 90th percentile or above on the forest or district’s dominant fuel type , (3) live fuel moisture content is 75% or less, (4) wildland fires are impacting available suppression resource capacity; (5) the area is receiving a high occurrence of wildland fire, and (6) adverse fire weather is predicted to continue (NIFC, 2021).

Managers often coordinate with state, county, and federal partners to implement fire restrictions, but because different agencies manage different lands, restrictions may not always align across boundaries. For example, a national forest may be under restrictions while nearby county or municipal lands are not. It is worthy of noting, different agencies and entities may also use different criteria or require different approval processes to implement stage restrictions, so visitors should always check the rules for the specific area they plan to visit.

Below are the three stages of fire restrictions and the common prohibited activities initiated by these restrictions on federal lands. Local variations on prohibited activities may exist.

Stage 1

Stage 1 fire restrictions reduce wildfire risk while allowing limited recreation.

Typically prohibited (unless otherwise specified):

  • Building, maintaining, attending, or using campfires, charcoal grills, or other open fires except in designated, developed recreation sites

  • Smoking, except inside an enclosed vehicle or building, within a developed recreation site, or in an area at least three feet in diameter that is cleared of all flammable materials

  • Operating chainsaws or similar equipment without a USDA- or SAE-approved spark arrester

  • Welding or using acetylene torches or other open-flame devices outside of cleared areas (usually at least 10 feet in radius)

  • Discharging fireworks

Generally allowed:
Portable stoves, lanterns, and heaters fueled by propane or other liquefied petroleum fuels, provided they are used in cleared areas and meet manufacturer safety specifications with an on/off switch.

Stage 2

Stage 2 fire restrictions further limit ignition sources during very high fire danger.

Lincoln National Forest Stage 2 Fire Restrictions - May 2025

Typically prohibited (unless otherwise specified):

All campfires, charcoal grills, and open fires on federal lands

  • Smoking, except in an enclosed vehicle or building, a developed recreation site, or in a cleared, nonflammable area

  • Discharging fireworks or using explosives

  • Operating motor vehicles off designated roads (except in developed parking areas or trailheads)

  • Operating equipment powered by internal combustion engines (such as chainsaws) without a spark arrester, or using equipment that produces open flames (e.g., welding); some activities may be restricted to specific hours

Generally allowed:
Portable stoves and lanterns using gas, jellied petroleum, or pressurized liquid fuel, as well as fully enclosed wood-burning stoves with proper spark arrester screens.

Stage 3

While the stage restriction system is used for both public and private lands depending on the authorizing entity, stage 3 restrictions are only used on public lands. Stage 3 restrictions involve full closure of a forest or designated area. During a closure:

  • All roads, trails, and access points may be closed

  • Public entry and recreation are prohibited

  • All activities, regardless of type, are suspended until conditions improve

These closures are implemented only when fire danger is extreme and continued public access would pose significant safety risks or hinder firefighting operations.

Southwest Area Fire Restrictions Interactive Map

New Mexico Forestry Division put together a dashboard to provide the public with a real-time map showing current fire restrictions on public lands in the Southwest. Map data is compiled from various sources and mostly displays federal and state lands, with county restrictions reflected when provided. You should contact your local fire department or government agency for the latest fire restriction information.

Fines and Penalties

Once fire restrictions are in effect, violation of prohibited activities may result in citations, fines, or criminal charges. It is important to not however, that penalties may vary depending on the agency and jurisdiction enforcing the restrictions.

On lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service, violating stage restrictions is generally considered a misdemeanor. Penalties include a fine of up to $5,000, imprisonment for up to six months, or both.

Local jurisdictions in New Mexico may impose different penalties. For example, on county-managed lands in Los Alamos County, a person found in violation of fire restrictions may receive a written citation and face criminal penalties, but no explicit fine amount is listed in their order. In contrast, within the City of Albuquerque, violations of fire restrictions may be punishable by a fine of up to $500, imprisonment for up to 90 days, or both.

Burn Bans

Burn bans are another tool agencies and fire administrators use to prevent wildfires and protect public safety during dry weather and high-fire risk conditions. Burn bans, also known as open burning restrictions, are temporary regulations that limit or prohibit outdoor burning activities such as campfires, bonfires, burning yard waste, agricultural burns, and the use of fireworks. Depending on the severity of conditions, some bans may still allow certain low-risk activities, like cooking with propane grills or using enclosed stoves, while stricter bans prohibit nearly all open flames. Essentially, a burn ban means that outdoor burning is restricted or prohibited within a designated area to reduce the risk of accidental fires spreading.

Burn bans are typically enacted due to factors like drought, low humidity, dry vegetation, high winds, and elevated temperatures, all of which significantly increase wildfire potential. These restrictions are usually issued by local or county governments, as seen in Colfax County, which recently issued a burn ban placing several fire districts under restriction. They are temporary and remain in effect until weather conditions improve and fire danger decreases. Public notices, official county websites, and local fire agencies typically provide updates on current burn ban status, exemptions, and enforcement details.

Additional Resources and Upcoming Opportunities

New Mexico Fire Adapted Funding Library

Did you know there’s a dedicated funding library created specifically for New Mexico community leaders, landowners, and wildfire practitioners? The New Mexico Fire Adapted Funding Library helps users quickly identify potential funding sources for wildfire adaptation, risk reduction, and post-fire recovery efforts.

The library features funding opportunities, direct links for additional details, and a sortable feature that allows you to filter by eligibility type. There are currently 12 open funding opportunities accepting applications, and the database is updated regularly as new programs become available.

View the library
 

As Southwest Wildfire Awareness Week (March 23–27) and National Wildfire Preparedness Day (May 2) approach, community leaders and fire practitioners are gearing up to host events and create meaningful opportunities to engage their communities. The Oregon State University Extension Fire Program has developed a helpful primer focused on engaging adult community members at the local level in wildfire preparedness efforts. The guide offers practical strategies for planning inclusive engagement activities, tailoring outreach to different adult learning styles, and incorporating trauma-informed approaches to better support the whole community.

For those organizing preparedness events this spring, this resource provides thoughtful, research-based guidance to strengthen outreach and impact!

View the Primer

Continued pile burning at Glorieta Camps

Glorieta Camps Winter Pile Burning to Continue with Arrival of Snow on January 25th

Glorieta Camps and the Forest Stewards Guild plan to take advantage of favorable weather conditions and continue prescribed pile burning at Glorieta Camps on Sunday, January 25, 2026. This burn will be implemented by the All Hands All Lands Burn Team’s Pile Squad, a program of the Forest Stewards Guild.

Up to 74 acres of piles will be treated with hand ignitions by trained and qualified firefighters working within the parameters of an approved and permitted burn plan. All burn operations will occur with snow on the ground and piles will be patrolled until they are completely out. This prescribed pile burn is a part of a long-term and science-based commitment by Glorieta Camps to improve forest health and reduce the risks wildfire poses to communities, forests, and watersheds.

Smoke and flames may be visible due to the proximity of the site to I-25 and Glorieta. Smoke may be visible from Pecos, La Cueva, and Eldorado. The Forest Stewards Guild works closely with the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) and the New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) to monitor air quality during the burn and limit the severity of smoke impacts. This prescribed burn is happening in the context of the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition landscape. The Fireshed Coalition supports a HEPA Filter Loan Program so that smoke sensitive individuals can borrow a filter for the duration of the impacts.

An employee of Glorieta Adventure Camps uses a drip torch to light a pile.

Click here for the full press release.

Want to learn more?

Wildfire Wednesday #176: Evaluating the Effects of Fire (FEMO)

Happy Friday, Fireshed folks!

Land managers, fire personnel, private landowners, and others all work, in varying capacities, to care for the land under their jurisdiction. However, caring for the land can mean different things, to different people, in different places. We live in a fire-adapted environment, so fire (prescribed or wildfire) is one consideration when thinking about caring for and managing the land.

It all begs the question - how do we understand the effects of our land management decisions? How do we improve our management of wildfire, intentional fire, and fire-adapted ecosystems? This is where monitoring (observing and tracking changes in ecosystems over time) and observations-based adaptive management comes in. For fire specifically, we can monitor fire effects (the way that fire changes the area it burns through) to understand the conditions and tools used to influence fire outcomes. Today’s newsletter dives deeper into the what, where, and why of Fire Effects Monitoring.

This Fire Friday features:

Be well,
Rachel

 

Fire Effects Monitoring: the Basics

What is Fire Effects Monitoring?

A visualization of the adaptive management cycle.
Illustration credit: National Park Service.

Fire effects monitoring is a term used to describe the observation and evaluation of landscape conditions before, during, and after fires. It helps us understand how those fires impact ecosystems, assess management effectiveness, ensure firefighter safety, and guide future land management decisions (a process called adaptive management).

Why is it done?

  • Safety: observations provide real-time information on fire behavior, spread, perimeter location, and changing conditions that can impact these things for tactical decisions during burns.

  • Effectiveness: monitoring measures ecosystem health, damage, and benefits over time, providing unbiased data that can be used to evaluate if fires meet hazardous fuel reduction/ecological goals or otherwise improve ecosystem health and function.

  • Knowledge: knowing real-world fire effects provides actionable data and lessons learned for adaptive management, providing suggestions for improvement on future burns.

Who does it?

A fire effects monitor records on-site weather data (temperature, relative humidity, wind, etc.) prior to ignitions on a prescribed burn. Having up-to-date weather and conditions information allows burn managers to make the best decisions about how, where, and if to light a burn. In this photo, a red pocket kit with scientific tools for measuring weather parameters can been seen sitting on top of the FEMO’s fire pack.

Fire Effects Monitoring Officers (FEMOs), also called Fire Effects Monitors, collect data to inform their team’s understanding of what fire is doing and changing on the ground and help managers assess safety and achieve objectives. They are individuals who have experience with fire and have received training on how to measure and evaluate the different metrics necessary to determine fire effects. Depending on their affiliation, these Monitors will follow different Fire Effects Monitoring protocols and focus on collecting different data. For example, Monitors with the National Park Service regularly and frequently collect in-depth environmental data from specific locations (called plots), allowing them to directly compare pre-fire conditions to post-fire measurements (check out the NPS monitoring handbook for more information). Monitors with the U.S. Forest Service generally focus on providing their personal observations of wildfires to their module leader, crew boss, or other fireline supervisors to inform safety, suppression, and tactical decisions. Monitors with nonprofits, universities, and other organizations will tailor monitoring protocols to their unique needs, or the needs of each individual burn (e.g. focusing on smoke observations during a prescribed burn to ensure that nearby communities are not being unnecessarily impacted).

What is collected?

FEMO data collection can include measurements of fuel (amount and condition of flammable material), fire behavior, weather, smoke, and environmental effects on vegetation and fuels. On wildfires, monitoring helps maintain tactical situational awareness for the safety of fire crews and determine whether the team is achieving incident goals. On intentional (prescribed or controlled) burns, monitoring helps to ensure that fire behavior and effects remain within the range of conditions allowed by the prescription (the fire plan which establishes objectives, desired effects, and allowable fire behavior). Some data, like weather observations and fire behavior and spread, will generally be collected daily for each day that the fire is active, while other data, like measurements of fuel and vegetation moisture or amount of fuel consumed, will be collected less frequently. The type and frequency of data collection is based on incident management needs, reporting requirements, and objectives.

 

How FEMO Findings Are Used

So what happens to all of this monitoring data?

During a burn, a FEMO’s observations may be used to improve the SPOT weather forecast (a location-specific hourly weather forecast from NOAA) or help the burn boss (individual overseeing a prescribed burn) understand whether they are meeting their burn objectives. This can help the whole team adjust their actions and be immediately reactive to improve outcomes in the short-term (while a fire is ongoing).

An example FEMO report from a prescribed burn in west-central New Mexico. The contents of the report will vary based on landowner needs and the individual writing the report, but they will generally contain maps and background on the burn, objectives and methods, a summary of the burn activities and weather, and detailed information on the burn behavior, smoke, and fire effects.

After a burn, FEMO observations may be summarized into a report which is shared with all incident leaders and partners. FEMO reports provide a clear and fully encompassing written record of a fire’s background, timeline, effects, and lessons learned. They can be referred to after the fact, allowing fire practitioners and managers to see the big picture, learn from their mistakes, and adapt their approach for the next burn, leading to better outcomes in the long term. (e.g. A fire manager might see that fuels reduction objectives were not met because the temperature was low and humidity was high, moderating fire intensity and behavior. From this they could learn that they’ll need to burn that area a little hotter next time to consume the slash and woody debris they want gone.)

FEMO reports can also be shared with external partners and agencies, contributing to collective and collaborative knowledge sharing. As lifelong students of fire there is always something to learn from others’ experiences.

 

Ecological Benefits of Fire

Periodic, low- to moderate-intensity fire can have many positive effects across ecosystems. Keep reading to learn more or click on any of these resources to dive deeper.

“Cleans” the forest floor

Deep duff, or pine needles and other forest debris, can be seen piled at the base of this fire-adapted ponderosa pine tree following decades of fire suppression and interruption of the natural fire cycle. Reintroduction of fire to these systems can “clean up” the forest, cycle nutrients back into the soil, and help restore resilience to severe fire, drought, and pests and disease.

  • When fire travels through the forest understory, it removes the topmost layer of leaves, needles, and dead or decaying plants. By removing this debris, it opens up space on the forest floor where growth of new plants is encouraged and reduces the amount of fuel that could burn in a future fire, therefore reducing the likelihood of negative future outcomes.

  • Returns nutrients to soil

    The relationship between fire and soil nutrients is complex because of the interactions among many factors. Some soil nutrients will be lost as a low- to moderate-intensity fire consumes organic material in the upper soil layers (greater nutrient losses occurs with higher fire intensity). However, in the long-term fire helps to kickstart the nutrient cycle (the amount of available nutrients in an ecosystem) by increasing soil nutrient turnover rates and redistributing nutrients through the soil profile. For example, soil fertility increases after low-intensity fire as the fire chemically converts nutrients in dead plants that would otherwise take much longer to decay and return to the soil.

  • Increases diversity

    When fire is removed from or suppressed in fire-adapted forests, it leads to over-crowding (trees growing thick and dense) and prevents sunlight from reaching the forest floor, creating intense competition for water and available nutrients. Low- and moderate-intensity fire creates gaps in the canopy, allowing sunlight to filter through and (after several years) increasing the availability of soil nutrients and water. The right kind of fire can also reduce invasive/noxious weed infestations, allowing an opportunity for native plants to grow and establish. Some native species require fire for seed germination!

  • Creates new habitat

    Fire removes thick brush, maintains open meadows, and thins out dense forests, all creating new habitat for animals and birds. Trees that do not survive the fire create new habitat for insects and cavity nesting birds and animals. When a fire burns in a mosaic pattern (burns at variable intensity and severity depending on the terrain and conditions), it creates a diverse patchwork of habitat for different species of wildlife.

  • Kills pests and diseases

    Fire can reduce or eradicate populations of beetles, mites and other harmful pests, reducing disease and keeping forests healthier.

The fire cycle, simplified.
Photo credit: Harvey Mudd College

 

Additional Resources

Upcoming Webinars

27 January, 12pm MT: Aspen Restoration Using Intentional Fire: A Case Study from Monroe Mountain, UT
This webinar from the Southwest Fire Science Consortium and Southern Rockies Fire Science Network will offer information on an aspen restoration case study from south-central Utah which used high-intensity, high-severity prescribed fire coupled with conifer thinning to improve aspen ecosystem health.

Register Now

4 February, 11:30am MT: Loss of Old-Growth Forest to Fire
Fire suppression and past selective logging of large trees have fundamentally changed frequent-fire-adapted forests. In this Prescribed Fire for Forest Management series webinar, speaker Scott Stephens will discuss the multiple pathways for achieving success in management of mixed conifer forests, with a focus on the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Join Link

10 February, 11am MT: Fuel Break Effectiveness: What Have We Learned So Far?

Jen Croft, Stephen Filmore, Mark Finney, Kit O’Connor, Brad Pietruszka and Erin Belval will be the panelists for this webinar in the USDA Forest Service Research & Development Deep Dive Panel Discussions series. This series is intended for fire, fuels and land managers on critical topics associated with fuels and fire management.

Register Now

12 February, 1pm MT: Policy Update on the Fix Our Forests Act (FOFA)
This policy update presentation from the Forest Stewards Guild and Southwest Fire Science Consortium will provide insights into the Fix Our Forests Act, including the uptake of wildfire management recommendations to congress and the potential impacts on federal land management agencies and the forests they oversee.

Register Now

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Resources

Annual Round Up: Science You Can Use
2025 marked another year of impactful science from the USDA - Rocky Mountain Research Station. Now, all of their bite-sized and information-packed Science You Can Use bulletins, fact sheets, and more from the past year are available in one place, from bees to beavers and biochar to smoke! To listen instead, you can now stream their science.
Click here to view a multi-year archive of science briefs from the RMRS.

View the 2025 collection

Opinion Article from the NM State Forester: Wildfire prevention costs less than suppression
In this article, New Mexico state forester Laura McCarthy calls wildfire prevention “suppression’s undercover partner” and identifies the three fronts for fire prevention: public awareness and early detection, fuel treatments, and individual defensible space and home hardening action. You can learn about the difference between fire prevention and fire suppression in Wildfire Wednesday #107.

Read the article

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Funding

New Mexico Counties is pleased to announce the 2026-2027 Wildfire Risk Reduction Program. The grant program assists communities throughout New Mexico in reducing their risk from wildland fire on non-federal lands. Funding for this program is provided by the National Fire Plan through the Department of the Interior/Bureau of Land Management for communities in the wildland-urban interface and is intended to directly benefit communities that may be impacted by wildland fire initiating from or spreading to BLM public land. 

 Funding categories include:

  • CWPP updates up to $30,000/project

  • Education and outreach activities up to $20,000/project

  • Hazardous fuels reduction projects up to $100,000/project

The application and checklist are located on the NMC website: https://www.nmcounties.org/services/programs/

Click to view the application packet
Click to view the application form

Pile burning in the Santa Fe National Forest (Week of Jan. 5)

The Española Ranger District of the Santa Fe National Forest plans to burn piles in the Tesuque Creek area Jan. 8-9th (snow dependent).

After igniting the piles, fire crews will continue work to secure and then patrol the piles over the weekend and beyond. Patrols will continue until no smoke or heat are detected on the unit from hand cold-trailing by on-the-ground crews or infrared technology. The burn will not be declared out until infrared flights detect no heat.

To mitigate smoke impacts, ignitions will end around by mid-afternoon if ventilation is poor.

The purpose of this pile burn is to increase resiliency of the forest to high-severity wildfire as well as drought and insect and disease outbreaks (such as the visible recent Douglas-fir tussock moth outbreak). Projects like this will also protect our water from the Santa Fe Municipal Watershed and surrounding watersheds that are currently threated by high-severity fire.

Want to learn more?

Photos from collaborative pile burning in previous years in the Santa Fe National Forest (in Pacheco Canyon). Photo Credit: Forest Service

Click below to read the Forest Service news release:


Wildfire Wednesday #174: Lessons from Large Urban Conflagrations

Historically, most wildfires in the United States occurred between May and November with peak fire season happening in August when conditions are hottest and driest. However, as weather patterns change, temperatures rise, drought events increase, and pests, disease, and invasive species make forests more vulnerable, wildfires outside of the traditional fire season have become more common over the past two decades. Since 2017, some of the most destructive fires in the western U.S. have burned outside of that typical fire season (Thomas Fire, CA; Marshall Fire, CO; Smokehouse Creek Fire, TX; Palisades/Eaton Fires, CA). Many of these have been fueled by unseasonable or long-lasting (and often record-breaking) heat and strong winds, causing explosive fire growth. Recovery from these fires takes years to decades and the landscape, and the communities impacted, will be permanently changed.

As we approach the one year anniversary of the LA conflagrations (the Palisades and Eaton Fires) and consider the changing reality of large destructive fire events, the question becomes what we can learn from past fires - how they burned, how fire personnel and emergency managers responded, how communities faired, and how we have or have not been able to recover - to inform and improve how we live with and prepare for fire in the future.

This Fire Friday features:

Have a peaceful and restful end to your year,
Rachel

Lessons from recent large urban conflagrations

One key aspect of what made the 2025 LA urban conflagrations - the Palisades and Eaton Fires - so intense is that they burned under red flag conditions (strong winds, low relative humidity, and dry fuels) which indicate an increased potential for extreme fire behavior and rapid fire growth. During the first five hours following ignitions, these fires were burning under environmental conditions which exceeded the extreme fire behavior thresholds of 2-minute sustained wind speeds exceeding 20 mph, peak 5-second gusts exceeding 30 mph, and relative humidity below 15%. These conditions meant that vegetation was dry and ready to burn and very high winds pushed the fires further and faster than firefighters could respond.

Anne Cope, an Institute for Business and Home Safety staffer who helped write the findings report on the LA Conflagrations, notes that “each wildfire event reminds us communities must prepare for the few days a year of dry hot winds — not the calm of everyday life. When fires ignite on the worst days, these winds push embers, flames and heat into entire neighborhoods. But the science is clear – when communities work together, we can disrupt the path of conflagration.” Below are some key takeaways from that report which may inform or reinforce our preparedness priorities and actions.

 

Individual preparedness

  • Nearly all aspects of the potential for structure ignition fall into two primary categories: the building materials used to construct the exterior of the structure and the intensity of fire exposure from the surrounding environment. The latter is closely correlated with connective fuels and the distance to surrounding fuel (e.g., decks, shrubs, sheds, or structures). (pg. 18)

    • When connective fuels allow the fire into close proximity of the structure, vulnerable components - windows, decks, and open eaves - provide the initial ignition points that determine a structure’s outcome. (pg. 57)

Probability of a structure remaining undamaged with an increasing number of resilient building component characteristics, showing an increasing trend in survival likelihood with greater mitigation. Analysis based on DINS data from both the Palisades and Eaton Fires.

  • Mitigation only works as a system, and partially executed mitigation strategies allow fire pathways and vulnerabilities to persist. Most homes exposed in the Palisades and Eaton Fires featured at least one resilient component, with noncombustible siding and Class A roofs being the most common (enhanced resistance to radiant heat and direct flame contact) and ember-resistant mesh screens on vents being the least (left these openings vulnerable to ember exposure). Many structures also had inconsistent resilience in different parts of their Zone 0 (e.g. a noncombustible pathway around three sides with vegetation and flammable furniture on the fourth side) which increased their vulnerability to near-structure flame exposure. These partial resilience improvements left major vulnerabilities, highlighting that resilience must be evaluated as a system of building components and defensible space. A structure is only as resilient as its weakest component. (pg. 45)

    • As the number of resilient components increases (e.g. noncombustible siding, Class A roof, double-pane windows, and enclosed eaves) the probability of experiencing no damage increases from 36% to 54%, demonstrating effectiveness of using systems-based home-hardening. These findings underscore the importance of establishing minimum performance requirements through parcel-level building codes.

    • This parcel-level approach is especially important in typical suburban neighborhoods, where maintaining more than 30 ft of separation between structures is often not feasible. Where structural density cannot be reduced in suburban environments, the building materials and connective fuels—especially those closest to the structure—become even more important. (pg. 4)

The zone immediately surrounding the home (Zone 0) is the most impactful place to make improvements.

  • Some types of fuel commonly observed within Zone 0 can unexpectedly threaten structures under extreme fire conditions. In the communities impacted by the Eaton and Palisades Fires, trash bins, hot tubs, furniture, vegetation, and more within 5 feet of homes created ignition pathways (bins caught fire which then ignited the adjacent structure) and caused damage. In these cases, the primary combustible component was not the plastic bin itself but rather its contents inside. (pg. 32)

 

(a) Partially consumed trash bin with consumed contents. (b) Embers accumulated on top of a trash bin with holes created by embers. These holes create pathways for fire to reach the contents of the bin. (c) Consumed trash bin that ignited an adjacent garage as it burned.

 

  • No plant, regardless of its flammability rating, is fireproof, and even well-maintained, well-hydrated vegetation can be rapidly dried to the point of ignition due to the intensity and duration of fire exposure during the extreme fire behavior scenarios of a conflagration. This burning vegetation close to homes can then compromise the building’s integrity when combined with other forms of exposure. (pg. 30)

  • Many studies have shown that fences built out of combustible materials, such as wood or latillas, can enable fire to move through communities; the use of noncombustible fences (e.g. metal or chainlink) reduces the potential for fire spread, particularly for fences that touch the home. However, in LA vegetation that caught fire was observed growing up or through noncombustible fences, reducing or eliminating the resilient effect of the noncombustible fence material. (pg. 35)

  • Even if homeowners reduce fuels in the zone that is 5-30 feet away from the home (Zone 1), structures with dense fuel coverage - greater than 25% - in Zone 0 are almost guaranteed to sustain damage or destruction (probabilities exceeding 87%). Overall, reducing fuel coverage both in Zone 0 and Zone 1 to less than 25% produces a meaningful reduction in the probability of damage or destruction to structures. (pg. 55)

    • Resilient building components offer limited benefit when heavy fuel loads remain close to the structure. (pg. 57)

 

Community preparedness

  • Firefighter effectiveness is strongly impacted by community design. (pg. 26)

    • Neighborhoods with high structure density and limited separation distances are likely to experience multiple near-simultaneous ignitions, quickly overwhelming suppression capacity. Communities with tight structure spacing and dense connective fuels have amplified fire risk exposures between homes and reduced effectiveness of defensive actions (fire suppression and structure protection).

    • The presence of defensible space increases the effectiveness of defensive actions (e.g. during the Eaton Fire, homes threatened in Kinneloa Mesa were reported to have good defensible space, which allowed Los Angeles County Firefighters to effectively defend them).

Structure-to-structure fire spread in Altadena, California following the Eaton Fire.

  • While parcel-level mitigation is necessary, it is not always sufficient to prevent large-scale loss, particularly under extreme fire weather conditions or in densely built neighborhoods. Post-conflagration studies have shown that structure separation, connective fuels, and building materials are the three central pillars of risk, with structure separation and connective fuels controlling the intensity of heat exposure and building materials defining a structure’s capacity to resist it. (pg. 51)

    • Even structures with 4 resilient building component characteristics but which have less than 10 ft of separation have a greater than 50% chance of being damaged. When the space between structures is less than 10 ft, the likelihood that a fire will exploit the weakest link in a structure greatly increases, often overwhelming the protective benefits of one or two resilient building features. At such tight spacing, if one building ignites, it is almost certain that wind driven flames will extend the full 10 ft downwind to touch the adjacent structure. (pg. 53)

    • When structure spacing is greater than 30 ft, the probability of no damage increases to 66% with those same 4 resilient building component characteristics. Adding either enclosed eaves or double pane windows to the resilient system (on top of noncombustible siding and a Class A roof) increases the probability of no damage.

Percentage of total fire size over the first four days of development for Palisades and Eaton Fires, shown alongside wind gust data representing general wind patterns in the area.

The most dramatic fire growth corresponds with periods when 5-second wind gusts exceeded 40 mph, highlighting the direct relationship between extreme wind activity and fire spread. Once the wind subsided, fire growth slowed, not only due to the loss of wind-driven oxygen supply, ember transport, and flame extension, but also because suppression efforts became more effective both from the air and on the ground.

  • Houses oriented downwind of the fire were consistently damaged or destroyed at higher rates than structures in crosswind or upwind exposures (due to diminished intensity of heat transfer in the upwind and crosswind directions); however, structures at all wind exposure orientations remain highly vulnerable when spacing between structures is minimal. (pg. 51)

 

Overall takeaways

  • Parcel-level resilience must be applied as a comprehensive system and paired with reductions in connective fuels at the neighborhood scale to meaningfully limit structure loss during wind-driven built-environment conflagrations. (pg. 58) To reduce overall suburban conflagration risk, parcel-level measures must be complemented by community-level actions—particularly efforts to reduce structural density and connective fuels. (pg. 4)

  • In urban conflagrations, damage is driven by the intensity of the fire, driving conditions (e.g. strong winds), and the fire’s ability to access an ignition pathway from one structure to another. These ignition pathways are created through either localized flame exposures that exceed the tolerance of building materials or through ember intrusion into unmitigated openings.

  • A systems-based approach that combines resilient construction, strategic fuel management, and community-wide mitigation is essential for wildfire resilience.

  • Spacing between structures (homes) and connective fuels, combined with environmental factors like wind speed and direction, are the two biggest driving factors which determine whether fire moves between homes, becoming a conflagration, or where structures are defensible.

  • When creating separation between structures isn’t possible, homeowners must take key steps. When homes featured 4 hardened components – a Class A roof, noncombustible siding, double-pane windows and enclosed eaves – the likelihood of avoiding wildfire damage was 54%, regardless of how close homes were to one another.

  • Homes with fuel covering more than 25% of Zone 0 faced an 87-100% chance of damage or destruction. That includes trash cans, patio furniture, and shrubs.

Read the full report
 

Upcoming Opportunities and Additional Resources

PNM Wildfire Awareness Town Halls

East Mountains Town Hall - 1/12, 5PM Ruidoso Town Hall - 1/15, 5PM
Los Vecinos Community Center Ruidoso Convention Center

Join PNM at an upcoming community event focused on wildfire safety and learning more about their Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) process. These gatherings are designed to share critical information, local resources, and practical tips to help protect your home and neighborhood.

PNM Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) map of high fire risk areas that may experience a PSPS.

 

PNM Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) map of high fire risk areas that may experience a PSPS.

 

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National Forest Foundation - Matching Awards Program (MAP): Connecting People to Forests

January 22, 2026: Deadline for Round 1 2026 MAP Applications

MAP funds projects that inspire participants to be personally involved in caring for their public lands. NFF requires that all MAP projects include three elements: community engagement, hands-on stewardship activities completed by the engaged community members, and a direct benefit to the National Forest System. Nonprofit organizations, Tribal governments and organizations, and universities are eligible to receive MAP grants.

View the Round 1 Request for Proposals (RFP)

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Rocky Mountain Research Station - Science You Can Use in 5 minutes

Trees in Distress: Prefire drought increases postfire mortality

Looking at four tree species—lodgepole pine, white fir, Douglas-fir, and ponderosa pine—a study led by a professor with the University of Montana and a research ecologist with the Forest Service investigated whether surviving trees were more likely to die within 5 years of a fire if there was an extreme drought before the fire. They found given the same level of crown scorch, severe prefire drought made a tree 78 percent more likely to die after a fire. Therefore, into the future, western forests that have thick barked tree species may become less resilient to fire because of increasing drought stress.

Read the Full Fact Sheet from RMRS

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Fact sheet: Fire retardant effects on wetland macroinvertebrate communities

The Southwest Fire Science Consortium released a fact sheet that discusses a review of the impacts of a commonly used fire retardant on aquatic macroinvertebrates. The main takeaway from the research highlighted in the fact sheet is fire retardants can seriously affect aquatic life and may contribute to water quality problems, especially in wetlands and ponds where the water is stagnant and exposure may be prolonged. Researchers also highlight that proactive fuel reduction and prescribed fire—especially near water sources and communities—can reduce unplanned fire risk and the need for chemical fire retardants.

Read the full fact sheet from SWFSC
The GSFFC is a coalition of public and private organizations. The GSFFC is not a subdivision of the State of New Mexico, as defined in the state’s Open Meetings Act, §§ 10-15-1 to 10-15-4 NMSA 1978. Although federal agencies participate in the GSFFC, the Coalition is not a federal advisory board and was not created by a federal agency, as defined by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5.U.S.C. app. 2, §§ 1 to 16 (2012). The GSFFC operates informally to support its partners, and is not incorporated as a non-profit, 501(C)(3), partnership, or other legal status.