June 16, 2016
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Fire Season
As I grew up in Santa Barbara, I learned to live with brush fires which occurred every summer, usually between August and November. As the climate has changed, the 'fire season' has grown to cover the entire year. As if there has not been enough going on in recent days, Santa Barbara is currently experiencing the first bad fire of the season. It began yesterday at the top of the mountains about 20 miles north of town, and by evening it had burned over 1,000 acres. The origin was near the Reagan Ranch that served as the Western White House during Reagan's presidency -- also directly up the hill from the Refugio beach where there was a bad oil spill last fall. There is also a summer camp in the same area. Normally at this time of year, the 'marine layer' moves in each evening, bringing in fog and clouds overnight. The jet stream is doing now what it usually does in the fall, and the movement of air is opposite the normal. As the sun goes down, the winds increase -- last night they experienced 45 mph 'Sundowner' winds in the fire area. The winds blow down the mountains, and last night they carried fire all the way to the ocean. The coast highway was closed overnight, and the fire grew to 1,200 acres. Fortunately, as the fire burned down the mountain, it didn't burn towards Santa Barbara, although the authorities are warning of unhealthy air today. This pattern will repeat itself tonight, with winds predicted to 30 mph.
This afternoon, a second fire began, several miles closer to town, still at the top of the mountains -- it was extinguished while still very small. These fires are particularly difficult -- they are beginning near the top of the mountains, where access is limited, and in areas that have not burned for 50-70 years. They fight them first with helicopters -- they have to fly to the nearest source of water and back, drop the water on the flames, and repeat the process. While they're doing that, they bring in bulldozers to create a fire road, and eventually larger fixed wing aircraft with larger capacity for water drops. There are also 2 converted DC-10's that round out the arsenal -- they drop a mixture of water and phosgene, a heavy fire retardant. The planes can only fly during the day, although they sometimes use the helicopters at night in a particularly bad fire if the winds allow. They are expecting to need about 1,000 firefighters to work the lines as well.
The firefighters commented this morning that they are fortunate that the West is in a relatively light period of fires -- this evening I learned of two other bad fires -- one in Arizona and another in New Mexico. It looks to be a bad fire season!
Comments (12)
Fire and high winds - a bad combination for certain. I hope you are safe and the air quality doesn't get bad! Climate change is real...
I'm safe from this fire, and the air is ok here, 250 miles away, but it just turned and raced down the mountain again, chasing reporters and travelers who were on the road that had not been closed again. They showed cars trying to cross the median, not knowing what else to do! There's no telling when it could happen here -- I think I need to put important papers in a box that I can grab in a moment, just in case!
I am concerned for the communities between Refugio and Buellton. The AZ fire is near three large communities: Show Low, Pinetop-Lakeside and Whiteriver. So far, a couple of smal subdivisions have been evacuated. The New Mexico fire is southeast of Albuquerque, in the Manzano Mountains. There had been no evacuations there, as of an hour ago.
Stay safe, if you are in Santa Barbara.
I'm currently safe at home in Orange County, but there's no telling where it will hit next -- there was a small fire close to here yesterday, but it was one of those that was put out very quickly. Between Refugio and Buellton there's not much in the way of communities, and nothing close by. Reagan's ranch is close to where the fire started. The prevailing winds blow down the hill, so the ranch and a nearby camp are relatively safe. The sundowners blow towards Santa Barbara, down the coast. The oil companies had done some clearing, so the oil processing plant is ok. So far the fire has not moved to the other side of the mountain, and it probably won't. Right now the reports are bad -- the fire turned again and raced back down to the freeway at Refugio, chasing reporters, and blocking traffic. Hopefully the wind will stay where it is and not move to blow towards Goleta/Santa Barbara!
@slmret: Glad you're safe. The stillness here in San Diego, where I am for the weekend, is deceiving. Nonetheless, I pray for the crew to get a handle on the fire.
It's actually quite still here in South Orange County as well, though the air is blue and quite warm! I hope this isn't a glimpse into the entire summer!As of this afternoon, the fire was 40% contained, but they expect the Sundowner Winds to come up again tonight!
I thought about you when I heard about the Santa Barbara fires. Stay safe.
Thank you, Doris! I'm about 250 miles away from the closest serious fire, but it is very dangerous to the welfare of Santa Barbara. This morning's news is that it's now 54% contained, and the winds have not been a serious issue for the last 3 nights, so they are making good progress. I'm afraid this is only the beginning of a seriously bad fire year!
Hopefully, you will get rain again soon. We had over 2 inches yesterday ~
There probably won't be any appreciable rain until September or October. Today's the last day of our first real heat wave of the year -- it was over 100 in the entire LA area, including by the beaches, yesterday, and temps were recorded up to 120 in some of the valleys. The Scherpa Fire, about which this post was written, is now at 8,000 acres, and 70% contained -- they were very lucky that the winds only picked up one night, and they only lost one shed and one small water treatment plant (the one specifically for a State Beach Park). Two more fires erupted yesterday behind Los Angeles -- they have merged and are still uncontrolled, right behind housing tracts.
Did I hear this evening on the news that the most recent fire could be arson? I am glad that the larger fire is now contained.
They always run investigations of the cause of unknown-sourced fires as if they are arson until they can determine the real cause -- the first day or two they are too busy to investigate unless they really know what happened, and then they sometimes keep it quiet until they have enough evidence, and so forth. The fire in Santa Barbara has not been announced yet, but there was some speculation that it was caused by somebody using a wood-chipper. One of the two in the LA area was caused by a truck that ran off the side of a mountain road -- the truck caught fire in raw brush, and the first spark caught the brush on fire. The driver died in the crash. I've not heard a word about the cause of the second one -- it could have been caused by arson (often when there is a bad fire there will be copycat fires), or it could be an ember that flew from the truck crash fire (they're only about 4-5 miles apart, and the wind was blowing hard. I also have not heard a lot of news yet today, and they could have had an idea by now. The two in Los Angeles area actually have merged, so it looks like one fire where there were originally two. And the Santa Barbara fire is about 70% contained, with the open part of the containment safely off in wilderness land. People there are going home tonight or tomorrow, and the firefighters are all in LA!
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