US Wildfire Forecast: Meteorologists Predict the Western US is Set for an Intense Wildfire Season

The Western United States will face an intense wildfire season this year, according to meteorologists.

The climate experts have attributed this due to dry conditions caused by drought during the winter season in most parts of the region.

Wildfire forecasts suggested there will be heightened risks in the coming months, especially aroun May to October, which is the unofficial wildfire season in the Western US.

The wildfire advisory was issued amid the blazes in the region, particularly in New Mexico.

2022 Wildfire Forecast

AccuWeather meteorologists stated that 90% of Central US and the Western US are experiencing drought conditions with a small chance of improvement in the short-term future, underscoring this will be a "precursor to another intense wildfire season" for 2022.

Wildfires this year have reportedly engulfed a total of over 1.1 million acres as of Tuesday, May 3, which is already more than twice the figures back in 2021 on the same date.

The latest forecast for the wildfire season was conducted by AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Paul Pastelok, a long-range forecaster, and his team, who focused on analyzing the weather patterns during the previous wildfire seasons to make a calculative prediction this year.

The team also took into account wildfire statistics for those years, notably the wildfire seasons of 2006, 2011, and 2012.

However, the AccuWeather meteorologists are comparing the said wildfires of 2011 to the upcoming season in 2022.

The common factors were based on resembling climatic conditions, such as anomalies in sea surface temperatures and above-average temperatures.

Southwest Wildfires

Over the past several weeks, wildfires raged in the states of New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, and Nebraska.

Evacuations are underway in New Mexico as the so-called "Calf Canyon Wildfire" or "Calf Canyon Fire" has continued to set ablaze areas near the outskirts of Santa Fe and Las Vegas, which also prompted local authorities to issue partial evacuation orders, as per ABC News.

In addition, new wildfires were also reported over the weekend in Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas, according to the National Interagency Fire Center, as cited by the said US media agency.

Wildfire and Drought Studies

Recent wildfires in the Western US have resulted in severe economic losses and social stresses with climate change to further increase the duration, frequency, and intensity of wildfires, according to a study published in the journal Environmental Research Letters in March 2021.

The assessment made by the 2021 study's researchers suggested that the region is certainly on the track of an intense wildfire season, issued a long way even before the said AccuWeather wildfire forecast.

Furthermore, the forecast for the upcoming drought-triggered wildfire season is also in line with a separate, yet a recent study published in February 2022 in the journal Nature Climate Change.

In the study, researchers have discovered the period between 2000 and 2021 in southwestern North America was the driest since the year 800 A.D.

The authors claim the 22-year period is equivalent to the megadrought in the late 1500s and projected this drought will "very likely" continue in 2022.