It looks like fire season has come to the Carson area. A wildfire sparked up in the hills above Mound House this afternoon, the Industrial Fire. I saw the thin white smoke curling up right around 4:00 today, when the fire was only fifteen minutes old. An hour later it was turning black and thick, the ash from the burning brush being released into the air. The fire is currently closing in on 1,000 acres, but at the last report it was about 25% contained. Hopefully they can get a good handle on it overnight.

Everything is coming together to make this a really bad fire season. A dry winter has led into a dry spring which will soon turn into a dry summer, and all the sagebrush and cheatgrass is just ready to burn. There are apparently 11 small fires burning in the desert north of Reno because of the lightning storm that came through the area.

And it's only May. Hold on for a long summer.