Sacramento temperature blanket 2024: Despite a cooler August, experts say wildfire potential is above normal this fall

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The last time I wrote an update for our temperature blanket, Sacramento was experiencing some seriously intense heat — record-breaking, even. But temperatures have cooled down in recent weeks.

We’re creating a Sacramento temperature blanket. Here’s why (and what that is)

Our blanket hasn’t seen a “celery”-colored square, which represents weekly temperature averages in the 70s, since May. This month, the icy green color is back, reflecting those mellowing temperatures. 

Katrina Hand, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Sacramento, said temperatures in recent days have been below normal for this time of year. 

“For the Sacramento Valley, the climatological normal or average temperature for this time of year is generally the low to mid-90s,” Hand said. 

I witnessed this shocking drop in temperature firsthand last Saturday, when I visited the Tahoe area to go on a hike but had to cut it short because of snow. Yeah, seriously. But Hand said she’s seen intense heat events pop up in September before, so there’s still a chance for intense heat events before the summer ends. 

“For the Sacramento area, it looks like the [average] high temperatures don't get below 90 degrees until mid-September and then below 80 degrees by mid-October,” Hand said. 

Despite these recent cool temperatures, we’ve seen other developments since our last blanket update in mid-July. Just a few days after that update, the Park Fire broke out and has since burned over 400,000 acres. And even though we’re near the end of August, we might see more fires in the coming months, since peak wildfire season tends to last through October. 

So far, CalFire reports nearly 400,000 incidents this year. This includes big and small fires throughout the state and amounts to about 830,000 acres burned. 

Adam Kochanski, the Wildfire Interdisciplinary Research Center’s fire modeling lead, said he’s expecting the number of incidents reported this year to eventually surpass the number in 2022 and 2023.

“Remember that we will have another two, three really active fire months ahead of us,” he said. “So, this 400,000 is actually quite alarming and I'm pretty sure that we are gonna easily hit the 600,000 mark by the end of the fire season.” 

Kochanski said he looks to fuel sources when predicting the potential for fires. This year, there’s a lot of fuel thanks to winter precipitation that boosted vegetation growth. The potential for fire increased even further after summertime heat waves that dried the vegetation out, making it better fuel. 

The more vegetation you have, the more fuels we have,” Kochanski said. “The higher the fuel load is, the more intense those fires are going to be.”

Then there’s the fact that La Niña weather conditions will likely begin to emerge in September. 

During the summer, Kochanski said the climactic pattern is associated with cooler temperatures, which is helpful at the beginning of fire season. But in the fall, La Niña often brings hotter temperatures and drier conditions, which could up the potential for fire in coming months. 

So, the summer — and the fire risk Californians have come to associate with the season — isn’t over just yet. For more details and monthly updated predictions, you can check out the National Interagency Coordination Center’s fire potential outlook reports.