Thanks for the update Brett. I never heard what stated the fire. I suppose it was something like that, that started the fire in Malibu. And as you say, no rain plus no brush clearing spells disaster. A sad state of affairs for everyone out there.
I think a lot of people just don't grasp how remote some of these areas can be, even in the populated areas. This is not like the east, were most places you go, someone has been there for centuries. Here we can have deep almost untouched forest a few miles from the most densely populated areas, and steep mountains and deep canyons. You can be driving along on flat ground at an elevation a few feet above sea level for hours and hours, then, in the space of 15 minutes, you are at 4000 feet. On a (rare) clear day, you can see it 100 miles away. An hour later, you are back at sea level in the middle of the LA basin. In between is a national forest, much of which is nearly inaccessible.
Same with the Sierras, even more so, although it's not nearly as abrupt. Start at sea level in (boiling hot, >100 degrees in the summer) Sacramento, going along I-80, and in a little over an hour, you are at 7000+ feet near Donner Summit and there might be snow on the ground, even in the summer. Surrounding this is some of the densest virgin forest and sometimes 50-60 feet of snow accumulation. Same going north, you are cruising along on the flat, within an hour, you are up at 3500 feet in a massive mountain range that a lot of people haven't even heard of (Shasta-Siskyou) , with huge volcanos right off the side of the road. There might be a Bigfoot villiage half a mile off the road, and you wouldn't know it.
Combine this with the classic highly seasonal rainfall - innudated from November to March, and then *nothing*, I mean literally no rain at all, from March to November. It varies cyclicly, sometimes massive amounts of rain/snow fall (usually in a few big storms, 10 inches in a day rain), and everyplace floods, and all the reservoirs fill up, then piddled out over the dry season. Other times, you get nearly nothing even in the winter, and the reservoirs get lower and lower. Then it all repeats, over and over. The heavy rain years build up the forests and blow over dead trees, then they dry out in the dry years.
The system counts on regular (natural) fires to maintain itself. Once people move in to the area, they can't let that happen, so for a long time, they would go out and clear the nearby forests regularly so not so much fuel builds up. Recently, this has been prevented by environmental activists, and the nutcases in Sacramento, so it just builds up. Add a few downed power lines, accidents (like the dragging trailer chains that started the Carr fire), and rare intentional starts, and it results in these runaway, uncontrollable fires.
I would add that unlike a lot of places, you actually *can* just start a fire with a mere spark. I spent a lot of time in the boonies in Kentucky, Arkansas, and Loiusiana, it's hard to start a fire on purpose. Drop a match, or burning cotton balls, on a typical field or tree, it just goes out. Not here.
Note that the environmentalists both permit the creation of these situations, and then exploit the tragedies afterwards. I am sure that some of them probably realize that they are doing it and want it to happen, so they can have tragedies to exploit. Moonbeam has used every chance he can get to blame global warming, where any disaster is "proof", and any counter-example is lobbying from the oil and goal industries. Weather is not climate when it's cold, but weather IS climate when it's hot, or you have too much rain, or not enough rain, or too many hurricanes, or not enough hurricanes. The willingness to exploit tragedies like the fires is blatant.
Brett
Topic: California fliers. how are you? (Read 2884 times)