In Connecticut, where Gov. Ned Lamont has declared a state of emergency, there have been 84 wildfires since Oct. 21, an increase from five over the same period last year.
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Rare Autumn Drought in Northeast Brings a Spate of Wildfires

Hundreds of fires are burning in New Jersey and Connecticut as the region experiences a spell of unusually warm fall weather.

by · NY Times

The unseasonably balmy weather throughout the Northeast in recent weeks, however pleasant, has stirred some of the driest drought conditions in recent memory, leaving New Jersey and Connecticut vulnerable to hundreds of wildfires.

In New Jersey, 377 wildfires have burned over 628 acres since Sept. 15, a jump from 26 wildfires with only about seven acres consumed over the same period last year. State authorities have not reported any injuries from the fires.

In Connecticut, where Gov. Ned Lamont has declared a state of emergency, there have been 84 wildfires since Oct. 21, an increase from five over the same period in 2023. The largest fire this fall, a 127-acre blaze about 15 miles south of Hartford, injured six people and killed one firefighter.

People are usually the cause of wildfires, whether intentionally or by accident, a spokesman for New Jersey’s Forest Fire Service said. The fires in the state are under investigation, he added. Officials in Connecticut did not comment on possible causes.

“We have never experienced conditions like this,” said Bill Donnelly, chief of New Jersey’s Forest Fire Service. “It’s so dry, the fires are burning down into the ground and are continuing to smoke.”

Having multiple wildfires might seem surprising for the Northeast, where rainfall averages are increasing and flooding poses a constant threat. But climate change can produce unpredictable weather patterns, said David Robinson, the New Jersey state climatologist and a geography professor at Rutgers University.

“Warm, dry episodes such as this are expected to become more common in a warming world, despite the fact that overall the region is supposed to get wetter,” he said.

In New York, where conditions are better than in neighboring New Jersey and Connecticut, wildfires are not as widespread. Earlier this week, a New York forest ranger said there were nine blazes burning in the state spanning 75 acres.

Currently in Connecticut, the portion of the state considered to be in a drought jumped to almost 14 percent, from about 2 percent earlier this week. All of New Jersey is in a drought, with more than half of the state classified as experiencing severe conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, which issues weekly reports and maps.

“It’s a tinderbox out there,” Dr. Robinson said.

Larger wildfires out west have prepared emergency workers in the Northeast with what to expect. In recent years, Connecticut fire crews have been deployed to fight blazes in areas ranging from California to provinces in Canada, said a spokesman for the Connecticut Department of Energy & Environmental Protection.

And last year in New Jersey, Gov. Philip D. Murphy gave $3 million to the Forest Fire Service so that it could update equipment and add employees, following an uptick in local wildfires and after much of the state was blanketed in a toxic haze from a fire out west.

New Jersey has been under a drought watch for two weeks. The Pine Barrens region, which makes up about a quarter of the state and contains forests, cranberry bogs and blueberry fields, is of particular concern for fire experts.

In this southern region of the state, homes are near or in the forest, Mr. Donnelly said, so access for emergency services can be a challenge. The U.S. Drought Monitor is likely to designate parts of the Pine Barrens as being in an extreme drought — the second-highest level in the organization’s ratings system — in the near future, Dr. Robinson, the state climatologist, said.

No appreciable rain, perhaps just a tenth of an inch in the coming days, is predicted for New Jersey anytime soon. A cold front toward the end of the week could lower humidity even further, which would — along with wind gusts of up to 35 miles per hour — threaten to increase the fire risk, according to the National Weather Service.

The probability of rain in the next few days for New York and Connecticut is a bit higher, but precipitation is still unlikely.

New York City, where Central Park registered the driest month in 156 years this October, now has moderate drought conditions, according to the Drought Monitor.

These conditions extend to Westchester County, just north of the city, where New Yorkers are currently getting much of their drinking water.

“We are closely monitoring the potential effects of this historic stretch of dry weather on New York City’s water supply,” said Noah Levine, a spokesman for the mayor’s office.

Other parts of the country have experienced unusually dry weather as well. After Asheville, N.C., was hit with nearly 14 inches of rain during Hurricane Helene in late September, “it has been exceedingly dry,” Dr. Robinson said.

Dallas and Houston, which have recently experienced drought conditions, are projected to receive heavy downpours this weekend, said Bob Oravec, a meteorologist with the Weather Service.

These scenarios seem to underscore that a warming planet can bring with it opposing weather extremes in short order. The results can be fatal: This week in southern and eastern Spain, a region known for its sunny and dry climate, catastrophic flooding killed over 150 people. Some areas got a year’s worth of rain in one day.

Dr. Robinson remains optimistic about New Jersey and surrounding states, noting signs of a weather shift possibly a few weeks away.

“There is nothing to suggest this is going to continue in the months ahead,” he said.

Dr. Robinson explained that rainfall in the region tended to be evenly distributed throughout the year. “We could come out of this at any time,” he said, “although we just don’t want to come out of it in one fell swoop.”

Judson Jones contributed reporting.

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