Severe weather in North Texas, heavy rains may help fight fires. But is it enough?
Severe weather moving into North Texas on Monday could help put a dent in several wildfires spreading over multiple counties.
Fires covering about 10,000 acres across Erath and Hood County were about 50% contained but under control Monday afternoon, the Texas A&M Forest Service posted on Twitter. A mandatory evacuation order issued Sunday for Lipan in Hood County was lifted as of Monday morning, according to a tweet from Hood County.
The National Weather Service was tracking several showers and thunderstorms over North Texas on Monday, said Patricia Sanchez, a meteorologist at the weather service’s Fort Worth office.
Several of the western counties in the path of the fire will receive between one-half inch to an inch of rain over the next day, Sanchez said. It’s hard to track how exactly the rain will affect the fires, but any kind of precipitation will help the situation, she added.
The rain Monday will dampen the soil but not stop the fire completely, Sanchez said. After the storms pass through, it will become clearer how the weather aided the firefighting efforts.
Much of Texas will remain in severe, extreme or exceptional drought conditions due to a dry fall and winter, Sanchez said. Monday’s rain will help in the short term, but multiple rounds of storms are needed to lower the drought conditions.
According to the National Weather Service’s forecast for the week, Tuesday will bring low chances of rain. The rest of the week will be sunny with highs in the mid-60s.
A series of fires in Eastland County, referred to as the Eastland Complex fires, grew from Sunday to Monday. What was previously a group of four fires became a combination of seven fires as of Monday. The blaze covered about 54,000 total acres and was made up of the Kidd Fire, the Blowing Basin Fire, the Cedar Mountain Fire, the Oak Mott Fire, the Wheat Field Fire, the Mangum Fire and the Walling Fire.
On Saturday, some residents in Carbon, a town of about 272 in Eastland County, returned to their homes after evacuating and found their houses reduced to rubble and ash.
At least 50 homes have burned in the Eastland County area.
This story was originally published March 21, 2022 at 3:37 PM.
