Little Mesa Fire Bombarded with Hundreds of Ping Pong Balls by Helicopter, Drones in Colorado

A wildfire has been raging on for almost three weeks in Colorado as of Tuesday, August 15, covering thousands of acres of land and causing widespread disruption. Known as the Little Mesa Fire, the blaze occurred after the region experienced severe weather in late July 2023. In previous related weather events in the U.S., severe thunderstorms have generated not only lightning strikes but also damaging winds, tornadoes, and heavy rainfall.

In response, the Colorado wildfire local emergency response teams bombarded the Little Mesa fire with hundreds of ping pong balls containing chemicals that can potentially quell the spread of the raging wildfire. The Colorado fire has not yet incurred any casualties but is a natural disaster that must not be ignored due to its life-threatening and destructive capabilities.

Little Mesa Fire

The Little Mesa fire (located 12 miles southwest of Delta, Colorado) has engulfed a total land area of 3,363 acres with an estimated damage cost of $934,327 and 10% containment as of Tuesday evening local time. This is according to data from the Wildland Fire Interagency Geospatial Service, NOAA Office of Satellite and Product Operations, and Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre.

The wildfire has been raging on since the morning of July 31 in the state's Montrose County triggered by natural causes and is now a 'Type 3 incident,' according to the U.S. and Canadian government authorities. It has been burning in an area covering pinon, juniper, and sage forest in the Dominguez Escalante National Conservation Area.

Ping Pong Balls

In response, firefighters tasked to quell the Little Mesa fire have deployed a helicopter and drones to drop hundreds of "ping-pong balls" containing glycol chemicals. Upon impact, the toxic substance will ignite to produce backfires and clear unburned dead trees. The U.S. federal government's Bureau of Land Management has spearheaded the operations to control one of many fires affecting western Colorado.

The ping pong balls aim detonate smoke when it hit the ground to prevent fuel for the lightning-triggered wildfire, which is common in California and warmer parts of the country, including the Southwest and the West Coast in general.

U.S. Wildfire Threat

This year alone in the U.S., there have been a total of 77 incidents involving large fires affecting 534,967 acres. Meanwhile, 34,650 incidents with 1.6 million acres burnt nationwide have been reported from year-to-date as of Wednesday afternoon, August 16, according to the country's National Interagency Fire Center.

In recent years, increased wildfire incidents, some caused by human activities, have occurred in forest areas and even near communities in the western half of the country. Outside the continental U.S., deadly wildfires in Maui, Hawaii, killed a total of at least 100 people after it spread in an area of the island state in recent days. Local authorities have yet to determine the cause of the Maui wildfires.