2020 Wildfire Season

[bodywhomper]

The landscape-ish level forest fuel mitigation projects that I’ve paid attention to in northern California start (or plan to start) with biomass reduction (thinning and hauling out the trees/brush), then follow-up with prescribed burn, and then use prescribed burn to continue maintenance treatments: yuba north fork, French meadows (American river watershed), and Tahoe west.

I believe the French meadows prescribed burns are now two years behind schedule because of getting no-go decisions right before the burns are to occur because of air quality problems. That’s a publicly funded project.

In my neighborhood, several of the larger property owners have been planning a prescribed burn over a few hundred acres in oak woodland/conifer mix. They’ve conducted prescribed burns before on that area, and one property owner has (apparently) been doing burns since the 1950’s. They’re now 2 years past when they’d plan to burn due to last minute no-go from the air districts due to ambient conditions. The no-go decisions are very expensive for the property owners because they already executed contacts for the burn bosses.

[Meadow Skipper]

Air quality, costs, and proximal habitation are what kills effective landscape scale Rx fire projects. Climate change affected fuels and burning conditions don’t help. It’ll just be nickel-dime for the foreseeable future, and megafires will be more commonplace.

[bodywhomper]

Air quality, costs, and proximal habitation are what kills effective landscape scale Rx fire projects. Climate change affected fuels and burning conditions don’t help. It’ll just be nickel-dime for the foreseeable future, and megafires will be more commonplace.

True

<sigh>

[splat]

Tuned into the Santa Cruz Sentinel to get caught up on what's going on there and caught a feature article on the homegrown Bonny Doon fire brigade that has saved numerous properties against the wishes of Cal Fire and most governmental agencies in the region. Crux of the biscuit response from one of the brigade leaders (comprised of a few pro firefighters and their neighbors) to a claim from Cal Fire that Cal Fire crews might not be able to save them if things got out of control was to the effect of "If we were under the impression Cal Fire could do anything, we wouldn't be here. We've only seen one Cal Fire truck in the last two weeks. If we left this to them, our homes would already be gone."

[neufox47]

Air quality, costs, and proximal habitation are what kills effective landscape scale Rx fire projects. Climate change affected fuels and burning conditions don’t help. It’ll just be nickel-dime for the foreseeable future, and megafires will be more commonplace.

Hopefully not, but it’s not like we have much political will to do anything that results in an immediate negative but avoids a catastrophic event. At some point soon though things may get bad enough to force action. I mean what happens when CA gets another bad drought year then these same fire conditions.

Drove down 5 from Sac to LA the other day and there was a section with 1000s of acres of dead nut trees. Are those somehow spaced far enough apart to not be a giant tinderbox or does no one give a shit because it’s the Central Valley?

[bodywhomper]

I haven’t driven that corridor in a while, but I believe those trees will be eventually ripped up by a dozer and burned in large piles.

Some things that may get CA to a tipping point of taking more action will be when the state finishes its incorporation of many suburbs into the wildfire problem. Wildfire severity maps changed from “urban” type designations to some sort of wildfire severity rating designation, and suburban homes will need structural fireproof material changes or have additional distances/setbacks between residences. My understanding is that homeowners insurance costs will be changed, too (neufox47?).

[neufox47]

Insurance costs are definitely going up. Many insurers are just pulling out of the state and CA fair plan is becoming the only insurer that will write many areas. It’s a combination of fire risk, CA insurance claim regulations, and CA premium restrictions. It leads to a weird situation where the insurance company can only charge say $2,000 a year for comprehensive replacement coverage per house, so they withdraw then the Fair Plan comes in and charges $2,500 for fire only at ACV.


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[Meadow Skipper]

Thing is, by the time you get to drought conditions, it’s sort of too late. Burns in areas that need it can burn too hard, nuking everything, including the soil, and present control problems. But when burns can be moderate, lots of times the public won’t fully support a project because, hey, what’s the problem?

Back when I was having a career, I found that you had two years, max, after a catastrophic fire to capitalize on public good will to push burn and thinning projects through. After that, enthusiasm and support dropped way off. That might have changed in these days of season after season of major fires. But as near as I can tell, there still isn’t a major funding vehicle for these projects. I could be wrong...

[old goat]

Thing is, by the time you get to drought conditions, it’s sort of too late. Burns in areas that need it can burn too hard, nuking everything, including the soil, and present control problems. But when burns can be moderate, lots of times the public won’t fully support a project because, hey, what’s the problem?

As an example--Donner Ridge fire of 1960, started by crew building I80 above Donner Lake. Burned the steep south facing slope and much of what is now Tahoe Donner. The slope above Donner Lake has not recovered in 60 years. Still large areas of bare or sparsely vegetated soil that runs off and washes out with big summer storms and winter rain on snow events.

[PB]

As an example--Donner Ridge fire of 1960, started by crew building I80 above Donner Lake. Burned the steep south facing slope and much of what is now Tahoe Donner. The slope above Donner Lake has not recovered in 60 years. Still large areas of bare or sparsely vegetated soil that runs off and washes out with big summer storms and winter rain on snow events.

Driving down from the summit I've always wondered about that slope - sticks out like a sore thumb. Makes sense now, gone from a mystery to yet another example of consequences.

[Dantheman]

Crazy satellite imagery: https://twitter.com/CIRA_CSU/status/1296910124821311490

We've had PM2.5s get above 50 ug/m3 here in SLC and we're ~600 miles away.

[old goat]

Driving down from the summit I've always wondered about that slope - sticks out like a sore thumb. Makes sense now, gone from a mystery to yet another example of consequences.

Apparently the fire was started by some guys cooking lunch.
We live at the bottom of that slope. We get a lot of water when it's wet, but we're lucky--it goes on both sides of us but we seem to be in a protected spot, so far.

[bodywhomper]

Thanks for the historic info about that slope. I always view it through my avi hazard mind.

I went to the wildfire BRIC forum last March (prelockdown). There was a lot of discussion about insurance and many high leve insurance wonks were there. My theory/hope is that the insurance fees will continue to grow, more policies will continue to be cancelled over a larger extent (eg existing developed suburban subdivisions like some burned in Sonoma county in 2017 and San berdu in 2003), and that will be a tipping point for changes. Maybe something closer to what the state’s planning for its own equivalent to the NFIP....

[Benny Profane]

As always, fire suppression, and then building in tinder is the problem.

https://www.propublica.org/article/t...anybody-listen

"Academics believe that between 4.4 million and 11.8 million acres burned each year in prehistoric California. Between 1982 and 1998, California’s agency land managers burned, on average, about 30,000 acres a year. Between 1999 and 2017, that number dropped to an annual 13,000 acres. The state passed a few new laws in 2018 designed to facilitate more intentional burning. But few are optimistic this, alone, will lead to significant change. We live with a deathly backlog. In February 2020, Nature Sustainability published this terrifying conclusion: California would need to burn 20 million acres — an area about the size of Maine — to restabilize in terms of fire."

[evdog]

Interesting read

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-...id=mailsignout

[KQ]

Firefighters from across the region have responded to the Evans Canyon Fire, which is burning primarily in Yakima County. As of Tuesday night, officials say the fire had grown to an estimated 12,000 acres and is zero percent contained.

The fire started Monday afternoon about 2:30 p.m. and is spreading quickly due to wind and weather conditions. Emergency officials said it’s threatening 140 structures, as well as power lines, radio towers and crops.

Our partners at Yakima Valley Emergency Management are posting regular updates for anyone who is interested.


Video of fire




Fire making run to north up to Umtanum Ridge and gradually moving eastward, so expanded the level 3 evacuation area (Go Now) north and east including portions of Kittitas Co. NW winds tonight will keep fire tending move eastward as the terrain dictates. Red is level 3 (Go Now) and Yellow in Level 2 ( Be Ready).

[KQ]

Crikey peole are shitty. Looks like this is becoming quite common:

Yakima Co. firefighters’ vehicles broken into while battling Evans Canyon Fire

[Meadow Skipper]

This is SO SAD!
Over 200 wildland firefighters have tested positive for COVID-19 and one has died

[old goat]

This is SO SAD!
Over 200 wildland firefighters have tested positive for COVID-19 and one has died

And that's just the feds.

[yeahman]

Grass fire from my roof. Does not seem to be heading our direction, yet. Watching the firefighters save houses through the binos. Superheros. Got the trailer hooked up and ready to evac but I'm not sure we can get out the road right now. Windy af.

[frorider]

This is SO SAD!
Over 200 wildland firefighters have tested positive for COVID-19 and one has died

...

When asked if the government would pay for the medical treatment of the hospitalized firefighters on the Cameron Peak Fire, Ms. Erickson checked with a higher authority and the answer was — it is unknown. That was the status as we published this article, but she said they would try to answer the question and get back. If so, we will add an update.

Ugh

[ill-advised strategy]

This is SO SAD!
Over 200 wildland firefighters have tested positive for COVID-19 and one has died

I fucking knew this was going to happen.

What a travesty. God damn it.

[snowaddict91]

I fucking knew this was going to happen.

What a travesty. God damn it.

Agreed. I feel for so many of my friends. They are taking some measures to help, but more probably needs to be done. I'm just not sure how.

[char_]

Here is an exerpt from a Wildfiretoday article on the Cameron Peak exposure and subsequent hospitalization.

How you can be in an arduous position and have a mask exemption is absolutely baffling.


"Before the first person who tested positive received his results, he came back to the fire camp and potentially exposed others, so five more people were put on precautionary quarantine. Local public health personnel determined that those five individuals were exposed within six feet for 15 minutes or longer, so they were quarantined out of an abundance of caution, explained Mr. Ratzmann. “Not one of [those five] have any symptoms,” he said. “They were all tested today [August 28]. We are waiting on the results and will test them again in three days and if they are all clear they will return to work.”

The person on the engine crew that reported symptoms claimed a medical exemption for wearing a mask, but the incident management team is now requiring everyone to wear a mask except when they are actually fighting fire on the fire line."

[frorider]

medical exemption for wearing a mask,

SMH