Early 8,000-Strike Lightning Storm "Doesn't Bode Well" For 2008 California Fire Season - AlterNet

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In late June, an ahead-of-schedule dry lightning event sparked more than 8,000 strikes across California, setting off over 800 fires, many of which are still burning as I write. And if you're the praying type, you might want to start praying they can be put out before the conventional time window for such events arrives in late July and August.

"This doesn't bode well for the fire season," AccuWeather.com meteorologist Ken Clark told the Associated Press in June, shortly after the lightning hit. "We're not even into the meat of the fire season at this point, and the brush is extremely dry. It's not going to get any better," he added. "It's going to get worse."

How much worse? How much time have you got? You might want to spend it packing. According to a study published in Science last year, the Southwest region of the United States will enter permanent drought by 2050, and that's being optimistic. The seven states dependent upon the Colorado River Basin -- Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona and California -- will most likely war over what remains of its diminishing water resources. The region's thirsty population will also be beset by rampant firestorms, as portions of the snowpack that remains bypass the liquid stage and evaporate into thin, dry air.

As the Union of Concerned Scientists argued in the paper "Early Warning Signs of Global Warming: Droughts and Fires," published before global warming consciousness took hold this century, "Warmer global temperatures are expected to cause an intensification of the hydrologic cycle, with increased evaporation over both land and water." As the same organization explained in an analysis of the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 report, "Nearly 90 percent of the 29,000 observational data series examined revealed changes consistent with the expected response to global warming."

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http://www.alternet.org/environment/91757/?page=entire&ses=2c78538e9842d1eb231a6e1b2eccd055

It's the "No shit, Sherlock" article of the day! :D