In the midst of the Chisholm Fire’s most explosive phase, a funnel cloud was observed, and later investigation revealed mass blowdowns of mature trees within the burn area. For fires of this magnitude, we need a different scale of measurement and, in the end, the six authors of a peer-reviewed paper entitled “The Chisholm Firestorm” resorted to megatons, the units of energy used to measure the explosive power of hydrogen bombs. The energy released during the fire’s peak, seven-hour run was calculated to be that of seventeen one-megaton hydrogen bombs, or about four Hiroshima bombs per minute.
