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crusher
climber
Santa Monica, CA
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Jstan,
Is there any word on how this started? I haven't been able to find anything online and certainly not in the LA Times this morning.
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Barcus
Trad climber
San Luis Obispo, Ca.
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Reilly,
The smoke was too thick for the fixed wing aircraft.
(according to last nights news)
Marcus
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Barcus
Trad climber
San Luis Obispo, Ca.
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Crusher,
You can check the local channel, KSBY.com
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jstan
climber
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We have two big boys working Mission Canyon!!!!!!! Sounds like turbine engines and the tank looks to be maybe 1000 gallons. I am guessing the pod on the front is for infrared. Heads up display. The unit looks where ever the pilot looks and the display is on a helmet mounted screen. Round the clock operation.
We are going to make it.
Edit:
Long wave(8-14 microns) allows you to see through smoke better than does midwave(3-5 microns).
One site on the net says witnesses say they heard gunfire just before the fire broke out. Early yet.
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Good thoughts for your and your neighbors' safety, JStan.
Please be careful!
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flamer
Trad climber
denver
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Jstan.....
Forget the water.
Cut a 6"(scrape on the ground to mineral soil) line around everything. If the Fire is coming, with NO CHANCE of missing, light off the fire side using road flares then get yourself out pronto.....you didn't hear it from me.
josh
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roy
Social climber
New Zealand -> Santa Barbara
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Hi,
I'm glad you made it through jstan; it sounds like it was getting a bit hairy. From my vantage point (5th floor at UCSB) it was intense late yesterday afternoon. The flames around Arlington Peak were huge; even from here. I would not have wanted to be anywhere near the canyons then. My house was in the evacuation zone as of yesterday morning, but I didn't have anything really valuable there - I moved it all out when I was evacuated in the Tea fire.
The fire is still lurking in the canyons on its western edge so we are not out of it yet. There are big plumes starting to grow higher on the slopes. This afternoon could see another gale force wind so the risk of another firestorm is high.
Hang in there, Roy
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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sundowners up again?
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Jim Wilcox
Boulder climber
Santa Barbara
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Winds blowing-but not as bad as they could. Fire currently traversing the face going to the west(left)towards San Marcos Pass. Winds have kept shifting direction. South would be bad
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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jstan: "I am trying to save three houses so I was in Blanche's house next door and saw them coming. By the time they thought to look there I was already on the roof. Didn't even suspect I had it in me!"
But we know you do, jstan! Good luck, and don't walk under any ladders!
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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Ho man, be careful down there, meanwhile if you have to relocate, I believe Jox has rentals in the tweak 'n' weed zone.
No Lobos!
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Any more news? jstan? Fluoride?
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Jim Wilcox
Boulder climber
Santa Barbara
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Mighty Hiker,
The southern end closest to the city has held and hasn't been threatened much today. Winds blowing towards the mountain most of the day. It has crested the ridge at east camino cielo in a few spots and has tried to burn down the other side towards Santa Ynez, but they're beating it back fairly well. It is moving west and east in terrain where only aerial bombardment is practical or safe. The sundowners are expected in a few hours and that'll a be a deciding moment.
One intersting story of many. Last night the fire was doing it's best to break through the fire line at the city. The fire was moving quickly down a canyon being pushed by gusts hitting over 60mph. A group of firemen made a heroic stand at the mouth of the canyon, determined not to let the fire past them. They held the line and probably saved a neighborhood from carnage. The firemen were made of group from Pasadena and Glendale.
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GBrown
Trad climber
North Hollywood, California
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Jesus Cris John, how do you always manage to find a Foops wherever you go? A Nose for a challenge and Persistent about finding it. When the funs over there buzz me.
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jstan
climber
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May 10, 2009 - 05:42pm PT
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5 day TR:
Tuesday:
About 1 or 2 PM I was up in our 60' palm tree when i happened to look up. There were perhaps 100' flames in a very small area off the Jesusita trail but up on the flank of Cathedral Peak. The sundowner was getting a bit worrisome as viewed from the top of a palm tree so I endeavored to finish my task and get down. The wind was moderately hard that night but easing off as we got to dawn. Things looked worrisome. We were told evacuation is "mandatory" but the fact is an officer has no legal right to move a citizen off their property. None at all. I stayed as most houses burn down slowly from opportunistic spot fires once the main blaze has flashed past. The only thing you have to worry about is the fact the downside gets big if your planned exit path gets cut off.
Wed:
The first day of the Tea fire featured 60 mph winds but the second day eased off as I remember. So that fire was kept to a fairly small area. 200 houses tho. The Jesusita fire reversed that and wednesday's winds were very strong. Mind you the topography and the local heat generation make any general characterization of wind speed difficult. By the end of wednesday they were quoting 200A but the smoke was so thick I think the number was meaningless. Tuesday and wednesday I got water on the roof, laid out all our hoses, turned off the gas in the neighboring, now deserted houses, and pulled propane tanks away from the houses. I slept on the roof so that I could immediately see all around merely by opening one eye.
Thursday:
The morning winds locally were mild giving one hope as I was cutting back vegetation abutting the garage. Then I saw the first of three skycranes (I mentioed in an earlier post ) and I started jumping up and down and cheering. Up till that point we had had only four or five small helicopters and the tide was clearly going against us. Had the wind stayed low thursday night the adventure would have been over. It didn't. The increasing wind caused me to reconnoiter so as to determine how far away the fire was prior to dark. I went up onto a small hill above the pumping plant and and saw that while most of the local fire was well out to the west near the Arroyo Burro trail there was fire threatening a development off San Roque and just the other side of the pumping plant. The hill I was on had dead vegetation on it a good four feet thick and I saw points of light more like bioluminescence than burning embers. There seemed to be no thermal heat associated but the light continued even when I rubbed them against the dirt. They were worrisome so I got off the hill and went back to the house. When I got back to the house 15 minutes later I looked back at the hill I had left and saw it literally explode. C4 could not have been more dramatic. That was a close one. Then the hill began pouring streams of sparks toward the vegetation in our group of houses. The line had been breached and it was all going to go if nothing was done. So I got a shovel, put on some goggles and went back to the hill. When the smoke and sparks were too heavy I just put my back to them and kept going. The thermally generated wind was probably up around 60mph. and blew my Tom Scheuer cap away. (It went down a culvert so I hope I may be able to recover it.) The eucalyptus trees beside the pumping station were ablaze to their tops and that fire was headed down both Laurel Canyon and San Roque Canyon. Many of the sparks headed toward our area were coming from a four foot high pile of debris. I figured if I could get some dirt onto it the sparks could be reduced. Unfortunately the earth was like concrete and I did not have the mattock I needed. So the fire was going to go down both canyons and it was unlikely the fire would not also get to our group of houses. As I was heading back to the house to make what stand I could there I passed a fireman who told me in no uncertain terms that I was in the "Grey zone" and my future would be problematic if I did not get out. I had my truck parked on a slope ready to go so as long as I stayed aware should the fire come in around behind me, the final decision was yet in the future. Very near future but still in the future. When I got to the house there were four firemen on the roof and eight pumpers on the street.
CalFire has a Command and Control capability as good or better than any military force in the world. Within thirty minutes of the explosion of that hill they had assembled, where needed, 100-200 men and I would guess 30-40 pumpers. Santa Barbara would have a huge hole in it today had they not had the force needed to hold a quarter mile long line at Foothill spanning two canyons and the flanks to the sides. When I asked what I could do the firemen said you can get out. These guys I listen to. The big grassy hill behind us burned as did the large house at the top. But they stopped the fire where the grass met our group of houses. Our development would be gone for sure.
Our house is dusty but unscathed.
That's about it.
Oh yes. I think I still have the flu. No sense of smell at all.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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May 10, 2009 - 05:47pm PT
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Wow John. I am glad that you are okay. You are a real trooper.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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May 10, 2009 - 08:25pm PT
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Something new?
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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May 10, 2009 - 11:36pm PT
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John
I hope things will turn out not only for you, but
your neighbors. Please take care.
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Chicken Skinner
Trad climber
Yosemite
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May 11, 2009 - 12:26am PT
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Jstan,
You are an amazing person. It has been a privilege to get to know you. Be careful.
Ken
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mongrel
Trad climber
Truckee, CA
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May 11, 2009 - 01:15am PT
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Tom Slater wrote: "But fire supression turns them into infernos that devastate rather than do what they would have done under normal conditions."
Actually, not true for So Cal chaparral according to decades of research by the scientist who probably knows by far the most about California fire ecology (J. Keeley of USGS) and his many colleagues. This well traveled belief is in fact true for montane coniferous forest, but not for chaparral. The natural fire cycle for chaparrals is that, whenever the fire burns, it is a stand-replacing inferno, which is followed by a fairly well known pattern of ecological succession from root-crown sprouting and species whose seeds' germination is triggered by fire. So-called defensible space is not all that effective in chaparral vegetation under the wind conditions that regularly occur (as in the present case), not to mention the erosion and landslide problems that are created when the only long-term stable native vegetation (chaparral) is drastically altered or removed. If your house is in the middle of it, it is at very high risk when the inevitable fire burns every few to many decades, unless the architecture is of the most modern fire-resistant type. By far the best way to protect life and property is not to have development peppered throughout this vegetation type.
Conifer forest is a completely different story; there, the pre-suppression fire cycle was of relatively frequent but low intensity fires which burned the (relatively sparse) saplings and understory, but did not kill or consume the canopy trees. With logging of the big trees and suppression of fire in the dense secondary forest growth, now you have conditions where fires are stand-replacing, and there are pretty much just two alternatives, either wait for centuries for the natural cycle to re-establish itself (which might not happen in some geographic areas due to climate change), or spend a lot of money to thin smaller trees but NOT also log the few large ones while you're at it (as has been proposed sometimes to fund the process).
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