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Dr. Christ
Mountain climber
State of Mine
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:22pm PT
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105,000+ acres and only 2% contained.
Is anywhere within 4 hours of Tahoe not smoky? My lungs cannot handle this.
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sneville
climber
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:25pm PT
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How is the smoke on 108 all the way to the pass?
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:29pm PT
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How is the smoke on 108 all the way to the pass?
a section of 108 was closed yesterday due to another, smaller fire.
if yr planning a crossing, i'd be checking status all the way there.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:37pm PT
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Mouse, tell yer Nat Guard friend to have his FMS system checked - I'm thinking
that lowering the gear wasn't gonna help much. The FMS systems I'm familiar
with are more helpful as the nice lady says...
"Terrain, terrain, pull up you suicidal fuk!!!!!"
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:47pm PT
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Word, Reilly, word.
Word for the day/week/month: Pyrocumulus/pyrocumulonimbus.
According to the Weather Guys--
A pyrocumulus cloud forms from rising air that results from intense heating of the surface by phenomena such as wildfires or volcanic eruptions. The fires that generate these clouds can be man-made or natural.
A big fire produces strong upward moving air currents that carry water vapor and ash upward. The water vapor can condense on the ash forming cloud drops. The vigorous upward motions produce these pyrocumulus clouds that look similar to thunderstorm clouds, which also form due to strong upward moving air. A pyrocumulus is a fire cloud.
In Latin, pyro means “fire” and cumulus means “pile up.” Cumulus is a type of cloud that is common in Wisconsin, particularly in summer. Cumulus clouds are those puffy-white clouds with tops that have a cauliflower appearance. Pyrocumulus clouds are grayish or brown in color because of the ashes and smoke of the fire. The tops of these clouds can reach as high as 30,000 feet. It is difficult to locate the bottom of a pyrocumulus cloud as it is often obscure by the ash generated by the fire or the volcanic eruption.
If lots of water vapor is available, the pyrocumulus can develop into a cumulonimbus, or thunderstorm. When a thundercloud forms, it is called pyrocumulonimbus. Like thunderstorms, pyrocumulonimbus can produce lightning because of the strong updrafts. Rain can also fall from these clouds, which could help extinguish the fire generating the cloud. Of course, the lightning might cause another fire.
//
The anvils haven't formed over these clouds we have been seeing the last several days, meaning the upper atmosphere, at around 30 thou, isn't sufficiently cold enough to cause an "inversion," or flattening out of the heated cloud vapor beneath a layer of much colder air, which cannot readily mix with the updrafts. Anvils are good things, to my mind. What saith the Taco's few resident expert Weathermen?
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hamersorethumb
Trad climber
Menlo Park, CA
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:52pm PT
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photos of the start of the rim fire as seen from Pine Mountain Lake on Saturday August 17th.
We then went into Toulmne Meadows for some climbing driving right past the fire on Monday the 19th. We had a great time in the meadow. Thanks to all the firefighters and stay safe everyone.
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ecflau
Gym climber
CA
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Aug 23, 2013 - 12:59pm PT
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on the the CA.gov website (dot.ca.gov) it says 108 has no traffic restrictions.
anyone know how up to date this is? or is there a better website?
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adikted
Boulder climber
Tahooooeeeee
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Aug 23, 2013 - 01:02pm PT
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Does anyone know how it is up in the Meadows curretly smokewise? Does anyone think they will close the gates til this gets a little controlled??
Greg
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 23, 2013 - 01:49pm PT
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on the the CA.gov website (dot.ca.gov) it says 108 has no traffic restrictions.
yeah, that's the site. i'd just check again or listen to traffic channel as you get closer to sonora. or watch the roadsigns/tune to the traffic channel in case it changes and you need to re-route.
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Dr. Christ
Mountain climber
State of Mine
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Aug 23, 2013 - 01:52pm PT
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Does anyone know how it is up in the Meadows curretly smokewise? Does anyone think they will close the gates til this gets a little controlled??
How is Bridgeport? Hulk? Mammoth? Beeshop?
Tahoe fuking sucks right now.
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Ward Trotter
Trad climber
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Aug 23, 2013 - 02:48pm PT
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Maybe I was right and they concentrated resources to work on that western flank closest to Groveland yesterday into overnight --things look better there, for now.
Tonight the wind stays SW less than 5 mph and it will be marginally cooler. Good news .
The N and NE flanks are really opening up. Slight drop off in wind strength from SW could help there.
Saturday around midnight the winds shift to NE and NW...hopefully this won't mean the SE flank opening up, and making a run for the thickly wooded slopes in that direction.
Good thing about the NE is it looks like the beast might run out of things to eat up there. Less oxygen too.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:02pm PT
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Tuolumne evacuation? That sounds unrelated to the Rim Fire
Interesting Modis info overlaid on Google Earth
Note the info in the legend at top right.
MODIS data is from 11:45 PDT today. Yellow squares are effectively "out". The rest are still active.
All the way to Lake Eleanor? Looks as if it's not near Hetch Hetchy quite yet, although the HH power lines to SF have been down for a couple of days.
The evening of Aug 19 (red line fire boundary), I mentioned this fire to our local (Santa Cruz Mtns) CalFire camp Chief and he was more concerned about the big fire off Foresthill Rd near Auburn. He already had most of his crews and equipment on that fire. Then this fire took off overnight. That must have caused a huge change in the CalFire order of battle.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:08pm PT
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Tuolumne evacuation? That sounds unrelated to the Rim Fire
Tuolumne City, not the meadows. Tuolumne City is on the 108 on the top of the canyon. 2 or 3 miles as the crow flies from Twain Harte.
Reasonable expectation is that it's likely to run up the canyon, and then folks will try to hold a line at the brow of the hill there at Tuolumne CIty and the 108.
Look at the perimeter map from this morning-- this fire has multiple canyons to blow up with no defensible lines until it reaches granite to the northeast and 108 to the n/nw
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Ward Trotter
Trad climber
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:15pm PT
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Reasonable expectation is that it's likely to run up the canyon, and then folks will try to hold a line at the brow of the hill there at Tuolumne CIty and the 108.
Yep. Now that they've reasonably contained the Groveland flank they have no doubt been running additional crews and resources up to T City over the last 12 hrs.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:40pm PT
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How in the world are two airplanes gonna even slow this thing down?
Talk about pissing into a hurricane...
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:58pm PT
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klk. Yes, I know where Tuolumne City is, my post was ambiguous. Thanks for catching it.
I was surprised!
They'll be focusing their resources on structure protection. Obviously the PML development but also probably trying to keep the fire from crossing the Tuolumne River below Hetch Hetchy and protecting Hetch Hetchy dam facilities.
At least the winds are light so far today.
CalFire has the other major fire to deal with: American fire east of Auburn/Foresthill At least SoCal is quiet….. for now.
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PellucidWombat
Mountain climber
Berkeley, CA
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Aug 23, 2013 - 03:59pm PT
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Really begs the question for those of us about to start our weekly weekend commute in a few hours:
Thanks for the status updates everyone!
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