California is on fire again.

[Catsnclay]

I just spoke with my partner who had to evacuate her home due to the Irvine fire. She told me of the wild animals....deer, coyotes, etc....running down the hills in advance of the fire. Where will they go????

That really makes you wonder, doesn't it? > so sad for these poor wild creatures <


I have often wondered, if I had 30mins. to evacuate, WHAT would I gather up and take?????



Hmmmm........ interesting..............

What would/do you take???

[cmayer31]

That really makes you wonder, doesn't it? > so sad for these poor wild creatures <


I have often wondered, if I had 30mins. to evacuate, WHAT would I gather up and take?????



Hmmmm........ interesting..............

What would/do you take???

I got to do it twice yesterday .

From my house with the mandatory evacuation I grabbed my home insurance policy, my bank statements, my two check books, Frankie's crate, her bed, her food, a lot of bottled water, a sleeping bag and a pillow. I also keep my camping gear in two totes, one for the tent and camp supplies and the other for the kitchen and cooking supplies, so I put those in the back of my truck in case I couldn't find a place to stay. All in all I was out of the house in under 20 minutes.

From my parent's house, they were out of town, I grabbed the home insurance, classic car insurance, Riley's crate, her bed, her food, Bailey's cage, her food, Jasper's travel carrier, her food, more water, all the pictures that I knew were irreplaceable to my parents, and my mom's jewelry. I was out of their house in about 30 minutes.

After the fires died down early yesterday evening I began the process of moving the classic cars from my parent's house to a friends house a ways north of us. Luckily they were able to gather a few drivers and we moved them all at once, except mine which wouldn't start due to a low battery. All in all I think everything was successful. Got the important things on the first trip out and then came back for the important but still replaceable things of value.

Right now we're just trying to stay out of the ash and smoke. The fire seems content to burn a couple miles south of us, but I guess it's moving slowly north of the mall right now. Luckily we have full air support for the first time and it seems like things are better today. The fires are still not contained at all, so it's a waiting game. My parents have people at their house and I have my roommates evacuated families and pets at mine, so hopefully our area won't get evacuated again.

I hope everyone else has had a bit of time to breathe safely and isn't in, or hasn't been in immediate threat due to the fires. I'll keep my fingers crossed that we all come out of this covered in ash and nothing more severe.

[RICHARD]

A little hint about what to take if yor have to go.


The CPU on the computer is paramount. Don't eff around with the monitor or keyboard. I saw some people with speakers, keyboards and monitors in their arms. You can get those anywhere.....the info on the hard drive is what you want.

I have two boxes, Edward's sleeping hangout, on my desk. THey are filled with all the important papers.

I grab his arse, toss him in his cage and then the boxes go. It's all I need.

-----------------------------

It's hot and dry here in the valley. The sunshine is orange tinged...

The sound of helicopters has kept me up all night long. WHUPWHUPWHUP.

I am pretty good at knowing who is who for a long time. I can tell the Bell Rangers from the Firehawks from the Hueys. But it's almost scheduled now.


The Firehawk pilots usually fly over the house and make a lazy right hand spiral to the pad. The wind has forced them to approach from the south and plop straight in.

I don't mind the Fire choppers, it's the dang news flights.

Two TV stations fly out of the small airport.....They run their engines for about 20 minutes before they take off.....theirs is a noisy high pitched turbine engine that grates on the nerves after a few.

[beeniesmom]

I've been glued to the tv all day.
Prayers that the winds will stop and rain will come.
This is so sad.

[gini]

Rain? What is that?? Seriously, we will start getting rain just when we don't need it - and the thought of the mud slides to come gives me the chills.

I live miles in each direction from all of the many fires - but this morning the sky was a muddy beige. I ran my finger over my patio table that had just been cleaned yesterday - and I could write my name in the soot.

I have been sneezing all day.

Trish, I am so glad to hear that you are home and your babies are alright.
I pray that your home is alright too!

[sasvermont]

I, too, have been watching the news about the fires. I hope only the best for these people, much the same hopes I had (have) for the hurricane Katrina victims. And I thought I had (have) problems. Such destruction.

I wish we would spend more money on prevention from the damages of flooding and fires and less on war. 46 billion requested by Bush just yesterday. 46 billion more.

My heart goes out to the CA population as well as their loved ones sharing their horrors.

[gini]

Yes, I noticed that word too - BILLION!!!!

There was a newscast this morning from the Fire Department Chief in Orange County. He asked to vent. After the 2003 fires in San Diego County -
a "blue ribbon" committee was formed to study what needed to be done for the future to prevent so much damage and loss of life.

48 points were recommended as a result of that study.

Not one - NOT ONE - of them have been implemented.

It seems as though our priorities are really messed up.

[RICHARD]

46 billion dollars to implement -

Here comes another helicopter.....

Fire prevention plans?

When we have the little fiefdoms- small cities, home owners associations, zoning laws and all the em effing local politicos looking for a piece of the government money?- that money would be better spent loading it into 757s and dropping it into the ocean.

I just wrote out a long rant for the Dog house that I deleted on accident....

People depend on the gov't. for way too much and way too often.

One man was ticked off that he lost his home-the FD saved it once before, but now they are the EVIL FD..

A few minutes later I saw him doing another interview on another TV station.

The Fire fighters were probably his heroes the first time out. This time his luck ran out and he had nothing but bile and hate for them.

I guess the luck of an ungrateful bees turd runs out eventually.

--------------

There is no real way to prevent fires and losses from such..

I guess you can cut fire break roads around the forests, do not let people develop them and then pave a huge asphalt "no build zone" around Southern California.


46 billion should be enough to build a firehouse, complete with firemen, on every single parcel of land here in CA.

Our priorities sure are screwed up.

We are letting people-Another chopper overhead-build up to the edge of our forests and not making them responsible for their homes.

Sure, I want to live in the forest-but fire, bears, snakes and landslides make me want to stay a flatlander.

[cmayer31]

Some of the things that we learned from the 2003 fires have been corrected. The main one that came out of the 2003 fires was the need to communicate evacuations. Since the 2003 fires huge strides have been made. The reverse 911 system turned out to be amazingly good and saved lives and made the evacuations a lot more controlled. We did get our Fire 1 helicopter out of the 2003 fires and it was the first helicopter up and really did an amazing job while the political morons tried to figure out how to get the other aircraft in the air. That said, there were a lot of lessons that we learned the hard way to 2003 and we repeated them again this year, sad.

The one that saddens be the most is that the military once again wanted to help us, once again was prepared immediately to help us, and once again was slowed by Cal Fire administrators. The same issues that plagued us in 2003 came up again these last few days and the same sad results occurred.

The good news is that the humidity is up a little and the temperature has come down a bit. The Santa Ana winds have died down, but are being replaced by off shore winds that are hard to predict. It's a necessary evil I guess, the off shore will bring in cool, moist weather, but it's pushing fire back towards us and is much more unpredictable.

I hope everyone remains safe!

Just a small note.. we lost a lot of homes yesterday in non-forest or wild land communities. It just goes to show the unpredictable and destructive nature of wild fires. This fire jumped fire breaks as wide as the 6-8 lanes of the 15 freeway, and most every dirt fire road around. The wind was so intense that no width of paved fire break was going to stop this monster from spreading from forest, to foot hills, to city developments. It's the risk we take, no different than any community on the globe; there will always be fires, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes and other natural disasters; no amount of prevention can stop Mother Nature when her fury is released. Can knowledge and preparation reduce the damages? Yes, but sometimes these disasters even go above any kind of preparation.

[momoffuzzyfaces]

There is no real way to prevent fires and losses from such..

Well, one way to prevent fires is for idiots to stop setting them. They are saying at least 3 of the fires were set. They have one person in custody and are looking for another. I hope they make them pay for all the damage they have caused!!!

Stay safe everyone!!!