Capturing Variable Fire and Smoke Behavior in the Presence of a Turbulent Hydraulic Jump During the Lahaina Wildfire

Abstract The 2023 Lahaina fire was a catastrophic event marked by intense downslope winds and the formation of a hydraulic jump, occurring directly over the fire and on a scale comparable to its extent. The potential interactions between highly turbulent atmospheric phenomena and fire and smoke plume behavior pose significant challenges for capturing these events with numerical models. In this study, we use an ensemble of large‐eddy simulations (LES) to assess the variability in modeled fire spread for the Lahaina fire, where the spatiotemporal scales of key meteorological drivers call into question the relevance of individual simulation realizations. Our results show significant variance in wind and fire behavior across ensemble members, while also illustrating the utility of ensemble‐averaged LES in accurately capturing smoke plume dispersion. These findings contribute to advancing wildfire and air quality modeling as well as help inform impact assessment research.