The fire has charred over 533 square miles of land leaving several hundred homes destroyed and thousands of residents displaced.
U.S. Forest Service employees made multiple miscalculations, used inaccurate models and underestimated how dry conditions were in the Southwest, causing a planned burn to reduce the threat of wildfires to explode into the largest blaze in New Mexico’s recorded history, the agency said Tuesday.that details the planning missteps and the conditions on the ground as crews ignited the prescribed fire in early April.
As of Tuesday, the blaze had charred more than 533 square miles , making it the largest fire to have burned this spring in the U.S. It comes during a particularly ferocious season in which fire danger in overgrown forests around the West has reached historic levels due to decades of drought and warmer weather brought on by climate change.
Many mountainsides have been reduced to ash and once towering ponderosa pine trees have been turned into charred toothpicks. Spots considered sacred by the ranching and farming families who have called the region home for generations have been wiped out. The report stated that the crew believed they were within the approved limits for the planned burn and had a plan to construct a line where they could check the fire’s progress and cease ignitions if the parameters were exceeded.
A mix of spot weather forecasts and on-site observations were the only methods of weather collection used. The days preceding the ignition of the prescribed fire were described as a "weather roller coaster," and the agency said more data should have been used to assess the conditions. She said in a statement that it does not appear anyone involved in the burn was being held accountable for what she called "significant mistakes."
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