California Wild Fire Pics

[erkishhorde]

No because a lot of the people that lost their homes in the recent fires are wealthy people that can afford to pay high insurance rates and have a lot of influence. I don't mean to say that it's any easier for the wealthy to recover from tragedy like this because they still lost irreplaceable stuff but I've noticed how much more effort goes into saving the homes of the wealthy as opposed to the average people. Example: they never do air water drops at night and yet for the Montecito fire they had 2 going. Maybe that wasn't anything "special" but it seemed like more effort than usual to me.

[B.Rock]

No because a lot of the people that lost their homes in the recent fires are wealthy people that can afford to pay high insurance rates and have a lot of influence. I don't mean to say that it's any easier for the wealthy to recover from tragedy like this because they still lost irreplaceable stuff but I've noticed how much more effort goes into saving the homes of the wealthy as opposed to the average people. Example: they never do air water drops at night and yet for the Montecito fire they had 2 going. Maybe that wasn't anything "special" but it seemed like more effort than usual to me.

That's a different story. LA City was doing drops ALL NIGHT on Sayre and that was burning mobile homes. That's because LAFD has a policy where they will fly at night (as will LA County if they are specifically requested and there's a critical need), whereas CDF does not. It was an LA City fire, so they would fly it. If they were in Contra Costa, up here, for example, we have no aircraft, just CDF out of Santa Rosa (and God, it's nice to see them sometimes [and their dozers]). So we get no air at night. Such is life. Everywhere's different. 
While I agree that some places are extremely high-risk for fire - I'm looking at you, northern / eastern SD County, with your wicked interface and no freakin' county fire dept; most of our extremely bad fires burn a couple to a few hundred houses. How many were destroyed in Katrina or Andrew? Or the Iowa floods? California has a lot of people and houses...

[DesmoDiva]

Holy Shit!!!   

I guess snow aint that bad. 

[herm]

That's a different story. LA City was doing drops ALL NIGHT on Sayre and that was burning mobile homes. That's because LAFD has a policy where they will fly at night (as will LA County if they are specifically requested and there's a critical need), whereas CDF does not. It was an LA City fire, so they would fly it. If they were in Contra Costa, up here, for example, we have no aircraft, just CDF out of Santa Rosa (and God, it's nice to see them sometimes [and their dozers]). So we get no air at night. Such is life. Everywhere's different. 
While I agree that some places are extremely high-risk for fire - I'm looking at you, northern / eastern SD County, with your wicked interface and no freakin' county fire dept; most of our extremely bad fires burn a couple to a few hundred houses. How many were destroyed in Katrina or Andrew? Or the Iowa floods? California has a lot of people and houses...

feds also will not fly/drop retardant at night
too high risk for the pilots

[erkishhorde]

That's a different story. LA City was doing drops ALL NIGHT on Sayre and that was burning mobile homes. That's because LAFD has a policy where they will fly at night (as will LA County if they are specifically requested and there's a critical need), whereas CDF does not. It was an LA City fire, so they would fly it. If they were in Contra Costa, up here, for example, we have no aircraft, just CDF out of Santa Rosa (and God, it's nice to see them sometimes [and their dozers]). So we get no air at night. Such is life. Everywhere's different. 
While I agree that some places are extremely high-risk for fire - I'm looking at you, northern / eastern SD County, with your wicked interface and no freakin' county fire dept; most of our extremely bad fires burn a couple to a few hundred houses. How many were destroyed in Katrina or Andrew? Or the Iowa floods? California has a lot of people and houses...

Ah, thank you for the extra info. It's nice when my synicism is proven unfounded and there is actually a valid reason to things. I remembered hearing that during the Montecito fire it was LA's fire chopper that was running at night but thought nothing of it because I didn't know any better.

[Craig Thomas]

The winds weren't bad at all in San Diego, just 50-100 miles away from some of the fires.  Nature is amazing that way.

Last year's October fires, we weren't so lucky.

Here's my dad's 1991 Corvette ZR1...what was left of it.    Not to mention the house.

[River]

I'm actually amazed that anyone flies those missions at night.  It's incredibly dangerous even during daylight hours.  Fires create their own mini-weather systems.  The heat can suck an aircraft right down to the ground.  Flying those kinds of missions at night takes, well, big red hairy ones, not to put too fine a point on it.

And yes, I am a pilot.

[DesmoDiva]

Here's my dad's 1991 Corvette ZR1...what was left of it.    Not to mention the house.

Those pictures break my heart.   

Hopefully its tearin' up heaven.   

[NAKID]

and yet... people still continue to build there. 

If they keep building, there won't be much left "wild" to catch on fire 

[B.Rock]

Ah, thank you for the extra info. It's nice when my synicism is proven unfounded and there is actually a valid reason to things. I remembered hearing that during the Montecito fire it was LA's fire chopper that was running at night but thought nothing of it because I didn't know any better.

Glad I could help.