NASA Hunts Fire-Made Thunderstorms That Touch Space

Scientists spent their summer hunting some of nature's most elusive weather phenomena: massive thunderstorms created by wildfires that reach the edge of space.

NASA's INSPYRE campaign deployed aircraft across western North America this summer, tracking pyrocumulonimbus clouds. These rare fire-driven storms rise 30,000 to 50,000 feet above Earth's surface, matching the height where commercial jets cruise.

The wildfire-spawned clouds do something extraordinary. They create their own weather systems, complete with lightning, rain, and powerful winds that can turn a manageable blaze into an inferno in minutes.

Neil Lareau, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Nevada, Reno, explains the unique danger. "The fire makes its own thunderstorm, and in the process of doing that, it's also making its own wind."

For six weeks, researchers flew through smoke and clouds in a specially equipped Gulfstream jet based near Boulder, Colorado. They collected smoke particles, photographed ice crystals, and measured radiation while NASA's high-flying ER-2 aircraft tracked the action from above.

Ground crews in sensor-equipped trucks watched the same events unfold from below. The three-pronged approach gave scientists an unprecedented view of how these mysterious clouds form and behave.

Scientists only discovered the significance of these clouds around the turn of the 21st century. Satellite observations revealed wildfire smoke reaching altitudes previously associated only with major volcanic eruptions.

Once smoke reaches the stratosphere, it can spread across continents and circle the globe. It persists for months or longer, affecting how much sunlight reaches Earth's surface far from where the original fire burned.

The Ripple Effect

The research promises two major breakthroughs that could protect lives and improve our understanding of climate change.

Firefighters could soon receive warnings comparable to severe thunderstorm alerts. Lareau hopes forecasts will warn crews when a developing cloud might produce dangerous downbursts and wind shifts, giving fire managers time to evacuate personnel from harm's way.

The data will also improve Earth system models. Most climate prediction models don't account for the massive quantities of smoke these clouds inject into the stratosphere, said Dave Peterson, a Naval Research Laboratory meteorologist leading the campaign.

Better models mean better understanding of how wildfires affect weather patterns and climate across the planet. That knowledge becomes more crucial as climate change makes intense wildfires more common.

The challenge wasn't just flying through smoke and fire, it was finding the right storm at the right moment. Pyrocumulonimbus clouds can develop in minutes and disappear just as quickly.

But when the Wildhorse grass fire in eastern Idaho unexpectedly erupted with a massive smoke pulse, the team was ready to capture one of nature's most powerful displays of fire meeting sky.