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Tamarack Fire status near South Lake Tahoe on July 20th

vikingsholm

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We've been up at the Ridge in Stateline/South Lake Tahoe since Friday the 16th. I'm writing this as an update for anyone scheduled to visit South Tahoe in the next few days or weeks, in case you've heard about it and are wondering about its impacts.

Lightning ignited a tree in a somewhat remote area of the Mokelumne Wilderness a bit south of Markleeville on that Friday. The forest service sent out a tweet that day roughly saying that it was in an area surrounded by granite and not heavily forested right there and thus not a danger to spread or threaten structures, so they decided that for safety reasons, as they put it, not to send in a crew to put it out.

Well, within a day it had extended to 6,600 acres, to 23,000 acres the next day, and to 40,000 acres by today, with virtually no containment yet.

It has mostly burned to the north and east, threatening (and perhaps by now burning) Markleeville, some other small hamlets around highway 89, and forest area. It also began spreading north and west yesterday apparently, and the Blue Lakes road has been evacuated as a precaution. Part of highway 89 between Hwy 88 and 4 is closed now, and the fire looks like it has crept closer to Hope Valley and Blue Lakes, though hasn't reached there yet. This area is a fantastically beautiful recreational paradise, and along with the towns at threat, the fact that they ignored and underplayed this fire at first is infuriating.

Here's a state map where the fire extent can be seen when zoomed in:


In terms of the impact to the timeshare areas of South Lake and Stateline, so far it has not been all that bad. Smoke moved in on Sunday, but moved out Monday has mostly stayed down in the Carson Valley where it looks pretty thick. With a shift of the wind, it could come back in, but so far it is fairly light. The biggest issue is hoping that they can get a handle on the fire soon and stop it from growing - it's still a good ways from South Lake, but they need to build some good perimeters soon to halt its progress, is what it looks like to me.

From what I can see, the smoke has not crept up the east or west side of the lake much if at all, nor reached the north end. Will be going up north today for a day trip and will check that out further.
 

Nomad420

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Stayed at friends TS in Incline and left on Sunday due to smoke and ash. We only left a day early and per the above comment I have heard that yesterday, at least at the north end of the Lake, the smoke and ash had decreased.
 

vikingsholm

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Update on 7/21 - First of all, there has been some more info that has come out on the decision not to attack this fire immediately, and some of the early reports I read were a bit overstated on the lack of Forest Service response. The fire was actually monitored daily and wasn't growing, and did not spread until July 16th when a strong wind whipped up (after the July 4th lighting strike), unlike the first reports I read that said it began to grow the next day. There were also more than 20 other fires lit by that storm nearby, some of which grew more quickly, so that's where the attention went initially. So - the forest service apparently had to make some tough choices with limited resources - it's unfortunate that this is the one that got away, because it's not going to be easy to get under control soon.

That said, this fire is still burning out of control, and moving into Nevada near highway 395 south of Gardnerville. They're focusing on protecting the buildings in that area among other things, but have over 1,000 firefighters working on it. The winds have been prevailing from the SW, so it's spreading northeast towards 395, and smoke is still not getting into the Tahoe basin much. Looks sunny here at Stateline on the Ridge, but can see the smoke down into Carson Valley. Went up north of Truckee yesterday and it was all clear, but could see a large cumulus smoke cloud from the fire off towards Carson Valley as we drove back south.
 

Ty1on

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It looks like they've done a good job of holding it at West Carson Canyon. Their is still plenty of fuel between it and 4 on the South side. Into Nevada looks from the map like the worst front right now.

Edited because I wrote 89 and 89 actually branches East while 4 branches West, south of the fire zone where I was looking.
 
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Ty1on

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A lot of growth last night as the Eastern front of the fire spread south to the north shore of Topaz. Eastern spread should be slowing down as forest turns into grassland. On the northern edge of the fire, the updated fire map shows some hotspots on the other side of the canyon from the main fire. This could be bad as it has been contained on its side of the canyon for days, and if these hotspots aren't put down, there is tons of fuel to grow the footprint of the fire if these hotspots take hold and merge.

The western and southern edges of the fire appear to be contained or stalled as they haven't appreciably moved over the last few days.
I'm hoping they are putting heavy resources into holding the line at W Carson Canyon. I'm very concerned about Topaz as there are a lot of structures in that area.
 

vikingsholm

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A lot of growth last night as the Eastern front of the fire spread south to the north shore of Topaz. Eastern spread should be slowing down as forest turns into grassland. On the northern edge of the fire, the updated fire map shows some hotspots on the other side of the canyon from the main fire. This could be bad as it has been contained on its side of the canyon for days, and if these hotspots aren't put down, there is tons of fuel to grow the footprint of the fire if these hotspots take hold and merge.

The western and southern edges of the fire appear to be contained or stalled as they haven't appreciably moved over the last few days.
I'm hoping they are putting heavy resources into holding the line at W Carson Canyon. I'm very concerned about Topaz as there are a lot of structures in that area.
Yes, this has turned out to be a bad one, and I am feeling for the homeowners in the current path - hope they can get this one stopped soon.

Wind was light this morning and smoke moved over Tahoe, but has been lessening as winds picked up a bit this afternoon. Is only light smoke at the moment. Some more smoke expected to return the next few days over the lake as winds stay lighter than the past week, but that might help slow the spread of the fire too.
 
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