New Wildfires in California

Twostep said:
That is were my understanding ends. Evacuation orders are in place. He pisses with a waterhose. Sis goes to the house. Do people have zero common sense? We saw and smelled smoke, did a quick neighborhood head count and plan and got out before we would have been a liability and in the way.
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You have to wonder how people think and reason in these situations. Often, not only do they put themselves in harms way, but first responders too. Except with these fires...everybody is in harms way by default ! I saw another story where a man and a neighbor stayed behind to save neighbors' homes. This one had a happier ending. They managed to save 5 homes and were unharmed. Don't know if those homes will withstand the new burst of Santa Ana winds though.
 

Ronni said:
My son is a firefighter paramedic in LA and he’s been deployed for a week straight fighting these fires…12 hours on, 6-8 hours off, round the clock.

There is no control of Mother Nature which produces seasonal Santa Ana winds, which can blow the tiniest ember a great distance. 85-100MPH winds were recorded during these events.

Steep fines also don’t prevent a random individual from throwing a lit cigarette away, being negligent in tending their grill, walking away from a lit candle or any of the thousand other scenarios that can start a fire.

When a fire rages a firefighter’s primary mandates are saving lives and containing the fire to keep it from spreading. Because of the conditions, containment of the LA fires was impossible for several days.

The most sophisticated technology available can’t possibly negate 85 MPH winds or careless people.
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Ronni, I made Dua (a supplemental prayer) for your son's safety these last two days. I've been praying for the other firefighters and residents impacted by the fire as well.
 
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Best sequence starts @9:57 to the end. Shots of drafting water while hovering just feet off the surface.

 
I would guess EV laws are out about now there.
Sure, the States burning out! I was there in the
late 60's, it's a torch to light. Back then I heard
of a fireman setting them to keep a job.
 
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Don M. said:
When these fires are eventually ended, the next round of crisis will begin. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of those impacted will be left with Nothing, and no way to return to anything resembling Normal.

First, they lost their home insurance. Then, L.A. fires consumed their homes
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Even for those with full insurance, it would be years before their homes could be replaced. Typically it's between 1.5 & 3 years to replace a single home that's burned to the ground. With thousands now destroyed in a relatively small geographic area I can't imagine how all those places will ever be rebuilt within the next 5-10 years.
How many home builders are in LA County? What about building materials; where will all those materials come from?

I can't begin to fathom how all those people will ever be made whole again :cry:
 
Remember STANDING at the top of the hill overlooking Yellow and White homes with the street pointed toward muscle Beach early one morning less than 10 miles away. Everything yellow, date, late September 1970. Watched the Smog move in turning everything down that long hill brown. Soon the burn began, eyes nose and throat. So terrible a place to have to live. Hated the place. Never have a minute of California care here.
California a pack of H.S. t-ness.

Remember Weeds and the Song that started the show every morning, poorly built Cookie Cutters or Mansions. How much cash you choose to loose. Had to take my Brother to the Air Base Hospital for a Finger with a Bee Sting. Vicious little bT.ard. Man cried most of the day.

Of course the advise is Leave ya fools, get out of there. They don't want ya anyway.
Back then a Burger was $3.00 in Southern Cal. / San Deigo & the Latino waitress stole my wife's sunglasses. Nothing good about there!

How much did a Midwest Big Mac cost in 1970? 1970s: 65 cents An old McDonald’s menu from the 1970s lists Big Macs for only 65 cents each.
 
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StarSong said:
Exactly so, Ronni. The (often ignorant) musings of politicians intent on scoring points and people who don't understand Los Angeles topography nor its wind challenges can be crazy-making. I'm at the point of barely skimming this thread because it's so loaded with ridiculous suggestions and disinformation.

For the record, most FFs - male or female - would be hard pressed to carry a 200+ lb person out of a burning building.
The idea is that when a fire starts, is imminent, or an evacuation order has been issued, get yourself the hell out of there. Stop worrying about rescuing your children's baby pictures and start thinking about which you value more - your life or your stuff.
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Preach it Star! I feel very sorry for people who lost their houses and all contents, but I hate to hear them say, "We lost everything," when they obviously still have their lives. I love our house, after living in rental properties, moving around for the Air Force it was a life time dream to finally pay cash for a house with a yard, able to have a dog. But I would never stick around with a garden hose, or wish a young firefighter to risk his life for it. I would grab my purse and the dog and be gone.
 
I have been in a fire like that (1200 homes burned down), and you can blame all sorts of factors for it, but the main culprits by far are:
Extremely dry conditions (Climate change) in areas that see very limited rainfall anyway.

High velocity winds that can carry embers for 5 miles (I have had them hitting my truck while escaping, so I know). With those kinds of winds, firefighting aircraft are grounded. Even if crews are brave enough to get in it's path and cut fire lines, it just jumps right over the lines.

We think the firefighters just jump right on the fire, but much of their efforts (Along with law enforcement) are to get people evacuated safely. That can be a major challenge. Roads are blocked, and clogged with cars, power lines down, missing people, etc...

Limited water from municipal systems that were originally designed for home use, not massive immediate demand, especially when power to pumps has to be cut due to downed power lines.

Dense vegetation (Chaparral) that has to be burned periodically, but that's a very complex issue. The governor signed into law legislation to increase prescribed burns five years ago, and they have tripled since it passed. But even so, there are many other hurdles. There are private property issues, Federal issues (Environmental Protection Agency, Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, and others) which can get tied up in courts.

Plus, many people don't want to look at voluntarily blackened areas (Prescribed burns) around their homes, even though they don't have a better solution. Even if you had the massive funds to go into all these canyons and yank out all the brush, what do you do with it?

In the end, as long as people build in risky areas, the perfect storm will happen sooner or later and as heartbreaking as it is, all you can do is learn from it, and try to minimize the risk in the future if they decide to stay.
 
papa tiger said:
I didn't post it they did. Why should you think that the news
reports are Political, its the news. It's not mine! Sure, I don't go there.
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When using other link snippets containing actual political party names, official office titles, or politician names, edit those names to say, just first letters. In your post's case @GV that removes the author's obvious name they emotionally wanted to publicly attack.

With the imminent change in our nation's executive office, as another example, T is the R p some may want to reference in news posts. By doing so, that deflates the value of any attack while still allowing an audience to understand what is being communicated.

This is all a grey area at limits of what might be allowed, we members need to navigate wisely. There will always be politically oriented members and trolls, with agendas that loath these limitations regularly pushing limits and using any sign of others posting politics as an excuse to do so themselves.

This No Politics policy is wise for continued harmony on this board, one only needs to look at elsewhere to see what happens if not. Same thing with sexual content, vulgarity, and gore.
 
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MrPants said:
Even for those with full insurance, it would be years before their homes could be replaced. Typically it's between 1.5 & 3 years to replace a single home that's burned to the ground. With thousands now destroyed in a relatively small geographic area I can't imagine how all those places will ever be rebuilt within the next 5-10 years.
How many home builders are in LA County? What about building materials; where will all those materials come from?

I can't begin to fathom how all those people will ever be made whole again :cry:
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This in a state and city that holds mega events almost yearly. The resources including materials, contractors, equipment could become scarce just for rebuilding damaged homes and neighborhoods. Which means should LA consider giving up mega events like the 2028 Olympics. Mega events change neighborhood lives as-is with traffic issues.
 
bobcat said:
...Extremely dry conditions...
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It doesn't help that California's population boom occurred during a freakishly wet time in the area's history. Now that normal drought levels (over thousands of years) have returned to an ecosystem that time out of mind has experienced natural burn offs, there's a recipe for continued fire disasters to the dense human population.

https://pubs.usgs.gov/dds/dds-43/VOL_II/VII_C02.PDF

(Published in 1996 so "present century" is the 20th)

In moisture availability, the shift was​
from moderate effective drought, as evidenced by the records​
of tree rings and lake levels, to the relative wetness of the​
present century—a century that appears, from the records of​
lake levels, to be the fourth-wettest of the past 4,000 years​
(Stine 1990) and that includes the third-wettest fifty-year in-​
terval (1937–86) of the past millennium (Graumlich 1993).​
​
​
.​
 
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There was an insurance claims expert on talk radio this morning. He rattled off many numbers [too many] to remember but they were grim .

One thing he did note , that I remember is that, insurance policies are written in many ways concerning pay out. One was that many, maybe even most are written to state that for full premium payout the policy holder [home owner] must rebuild. Which means one cannot collect their premium , clear the property , sell the property and move .

He went on to say that rebuild cost in {California} are so high that many policies will not even cover the cost. Particularly if only a minimum policy was carried. He also said that building codes and environmental restrictions are such that build times will be lengthy [to say the least] .

He also said that this will cripple insurance companies in California , and that the replacement policy cost will be astronomical in cost to the policy holder. So much so that many will likely rebuild, and sell immediately , due to the inability to afford any sort of mortgage they might have.
 
rgp said:
There was an insurance claims expert on talk radio this morning. He rattled off many numbers [too many] to remember but they were grim .

One thing he did note , that I remember is that, insurance policies are written in many ways concerning pay out. One was that many, maybe even most are written to state that for full premium payout the policy holder [home owner] must rebuild. Which means one cannot collect their premium , clear the property , sell the property and move .

He went on to say that rebuild cost in {California} are so high that many policies will not even cover the cost. Particularly if only a minimum policy was carried. He also said that building codes and environmental restrictions are such that build times will be lengthy [to say the least] .

He also said that this will cripple insurance companies in California , and that the replacement policy cost will be astronomical in cost to the policy holder. So much so that many will likely rebuild, and sell immediately , due to the inability to afford any sort of mortgage they might have.
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I accidentally posted this reply before it was complete, so this is an edit. I intended to say that the part in bold surprised and disappointed me because if my home burned to the ground I would not want to rebuild.
 
One of the reasons insurance companies stop insuring in certain areas/states that Hurricane Andrew in Florida in the early 90s hit companies hard like Allstate.

20 Years Later: Insurance Changes Triggered by Hurricane Andrew

Yes the company as a whole still made 'a' profit but there reports off and on for years that Allstate payed out so much from Andrew another event might have bankrupted them.

In the end insurance is a bet. The company is betting you won't need it and the customer is betting they will.
 
WhatInThe said:
This in a state and city that holds mega events almost yearly. The resources including materials, contractors, equipment could become scarce just for rebuilding damaged homes and neighborhoods. Which means should LA consider giving up mega events like the 2028 Olympics. Mega events change neighborhood lives as-is with traffic issues.
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You want them to give up tonight's LA Clippers game?
 

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