Forest Service Details Errors That Led to New Mexico’s Largest Wildfire

Report says inaccurate models, miscalculations to blame for Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire

By Talal Ansari of The WSJ.

"The U.S. Forest Service relied on inaccurate models and miscalculated its planned burn in New Mexico that became the state’s largest wildfire in history, a review found.

The burn, which began on April 6, has scorched more than 340,000 acres, destroyed hundreds of homes and forced the evacuation of thousands of residents in northern New Mexico. It is currently 71% contained.

The Forest Service’s 80-page review, released Tuesday, found that much of the planning and analysis for the burn were done according to current standards and policy. But a “combination of changes in fuel conditions” and “underestimated potential fire behavior” was mainly to blame for the historic wildfire, it said. 

Longstanding drought, a lack of winter rain and snow and dry trees, moss, grasses and other plant matter helped spread the fire, the report said. 

The report also said the Forest Service relied too much on predicted winds from National Weather Service forecasts rather than on-the-ground wind observations.

Within five hours of the Forest Service starting the prescribed burn, powerful winds had caused flames to spread in the parched pine forests and mountainsides east of Santa Fe, and it was declared a wildfire.

It eventually grew out of control and merged with the Calf Canyon fire, which was burning nearby, becoming the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire. Weeks of high winds, including some gusts approaching 75 miles an hour, worsened conditions. 

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said she was frustrated by the missteps identified in the review. 

“It is very difficult to understand how a plan crafted several years ago could be repeatedly re-approved without adjustments or considerations for updated drought conditions, as well as how that plan could be put into place without any immediate data for weather conditions during what New Mexicans know to be a particularly windy time of the year,” the Democrat said in a statement Tuesday. 

“In addition, it does not appear that anyone involved in this burn was held to account for the significant mistakes made during this burn,” Ms. Grisham said. 

New Mexico, like much of the Western U.S., is in the grips of a yearslong drought. The dry conditions make wildfires easier to ignite and burn.  

Fires are outpacing models, according to Forest Service Chief Randy Moore. 

“Climate change is leading to conditions on the ground we have never encountered,” Mr. Moore said in a statement that opened the report’s findings. He added that the agency needs to better understand how climate change is affecting firefighting methods. 

In May, Mr. Moore ordered a temporary halt to planned burns in the wake of the catastrophic wildfire. He said at the time that fire conditions were too extreme to safely conduct the burn operations, and the agency would conduct a 90-day national review of its prescribed-burn policies.

“Lessons learned and any resulting program improvements will be in place prior to resuming prescribed burning,” Mr. Moore said in May.

In 2022, 31,000 wildfires have burned more than 3.2 million acres in the U.S., according to the National Interagency Fire Center. In New Jersey, the Wharton State Forest—Mullica River Fire, now 95% contained, has reached 13,500 acres. It’s one of the latest wildfires in the state in over a decade."