Fire

Arborist Forum

Help Support Arborist Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
The only section of the merced river canyon along 140 to not burn or reburn in the last 20 years is now burning. The briceburg has burned 50(?) acres. They almost caught it until it jumped to the east side of bear creek which has no access and some roads are blocking dozer transport access. It's steep as hell all around but at least it's not that hot.:rolleyes::chainsaw:



Mount bullion has a great view.
http://www.alertwildfire.org/sierra/

https://forums.wildfireintel.org/t/ca-mmu-snf-briceburg/9742/18

Does Bear Creek come in near the Bridge where Briceburg Rd hits 140 across from the Burma grade ??


Erik
 
They did firing ops last night and early this morning but things have gone sideways since and the fire is now approaching the Ferguson burn scar.
Screenshot_20191008-160318_Chrome.jpg
 
I’m interested in seeing how this Saddlebridge fire pans out in North LA. Lots of urban in the term urban interface there.

100,000 already evacuated with ~7550 acres at 13% containment.
 
Poised and ready in SoCal
ff82fbc8d09eb38fb2ac726e51f3ad57.jpg



Erik
 
I was down at Cal Fire SCU's HQ last week for a planning meeting. After we decided on the training for the upcoming season, I got a short tour of the ECC there. Wow, what a setup. They had 5 or 6 pods setup and ready to go. He said they also have a bunch of suitcases ready to be mobile in case the HQ gets demolished by a collapsed dam.

They said if we'd like a "sit along" we can do that and watch the action sometime.
 
Took a ride up to Tahoe yesterday for my granddaughters 21 st birthday, saw smoke as soon as we left Auburn off to the north. We followed it all the way up, it was coming from the area around Stampede reservoir, they must of got it out because I see no news reports of it today! By the way, PGand E MAY just shut the power off again today!
 
Took a ride up to Tahoe yesterday for my granddaughters 21 st birthday, saw smoke as soon as we left Auburn off to the north. We followed it all the way up, it was coming from the area around Stampede reservoir, they must of got it out because I see no news reports of it today! By the way, PGand E MAY just shut the power off again today!

Prescribed burn was going on up there yesterday.
 
wait until the conditions are more favorable, for Pete’s sake !

The way burn prescriptions are written, you need the conditions to be receptive to fire or there is no benefit to it. There are contingencies built in as well. After all of the approvals are signed and all of the phone calls made, there remains a final go/no-go checklist. Gone are the days of indiscriminate burning. Even the view impacts are considered, such as "will the smoke make it hard to see thing X from location Y?" Only when all of these conditions are met does the Burn Boss pull the trigger on a burn. You will not find a more risk-averse crowd than the RX burn community. I can assure you that this is indeed the right time of year for that burn or it wouldn't have happened. The prescription is likely a matter of public record -- if you're curious, you can probably get a copy and see where it was and what fuels were targeted and for which ecological goals.
 
The way burn prescriptions are written, you need the conditions to be receptive to fire or there is no benefit to it. There are contingencies built in as well. After all of the approvals are signed and all of the phone calls made, there remains a final go/no-go checklist. Gone are the days of indiscriminate burning. Even the view impacts are considered, such as "will the smoke make it hard to see thing X from location Y?" Only when all of these conditions are met does the Burn Boss pull the trigger on a burn. You will not find a more risk-averse crowd than the RX burn community. I can assure you that this is indeed the right time of year for that burn or it wouldn't have happened. The prescription is likely a matter of public record -- if you're curious, you can probably get a copy and see where it was and what fuels were targeted and for which ecological goals.

That’s a much better description & explanation than me giving out “Well, we burn when the stuff is ready to burn and the weather looks like it will work out so we don’t burn the whole place down. It just makes more sense and works better that way.”

I’ll just go ahead and second what Nate said above. It’s all correct, and at least in my area you can do an ORR (or just call the responsible agency, they’ll probably send it to you via fax or e-mail for free) and get the description, approvals, assets involved, yada.
 
I respect his opinion on how it is meant to happen ,but I’ve also seen these burns get out of control. It happend less than 5 miles from my home last spring and it left a pretty ugly mess right in the Tahoe National Forest seed orchard above our town of Foresthill. 3 days later there was another incident where things got serious another 5 miles up the hill, they claimed that the 2 incidents were unrelated, but it was pretty clear that they were. Mistakes happen, and I know prescribed burns are necessary to prevent the big ones, so Nate’s input is noted and appreciated. We live with the possibility of major fires every year about this time, it’s just part of life when you live in a forest, should be over in the next few weeks, then it’s all about the snow storms!
 
I don’t want to come across as to big of a ****, overly confrontational, or act like I’m talking down to you, but how can you be sure those two particular incidents were related? I mean, I wasn’t witness to anything in Tahoe or really anything in NorCal since Camp last year, but that’s a pretty bold statement coming from someone who just asked why they’re done at this time of year.

Five miles up the hill several days later is a pretty big spread. The same crew may have been on it, which may have had an effect, but I’d strongly recommend you do your research before saying something of to that ilk. Or you may have, and I may be a moron.

But, again, I’d recommend reading the incident reports from the individual incidents, which again, are easy to get, before just going out and claiming that it was obvious when a subject matter expert may be able to see and judge minute details that the casual observer may not notice.
 
I don’t want to come across as to big of a ****, overly confrontational, or act like I’m talking down to you, but how can you be sure those two particular incidents were related? I mean, I wasn’t witness to anything in Tahoe or really anything in NorCal since Camp last year, but that’s a pretty bold statement coming from someone who just asked why they’re done at this time of year.

Five miles up the hill several days later is a pretty big spread. The same crew may have been on it, which may have had an effect, but I’d strongly recommend you do your research before saying something of to that ilk. Or you may have, and I may be a moron.

But, again, I’d recommend reading the incident reports from the individual incidents, which again, are easy to get, before just going out and claiming that it was obvious when a subject matter expert may be able to see and judge minute details that the casual observer may not notice.
Does working in the area and having to drive through the fire as it happend count, cause that’s how I came to my conclusion. The control burn smoldered for weeks after both incidents. My opinion is just that, to be clear, so take it as such. I also saw aerial views of both scenes after the fact, it was all replanted after a major burn in the early 1960’s, they only replanted ponderosa pine and there was a lot of standing dead from the beetle infestation that has devastated our area. That area is also above town so no structures, power lines Or businesses.
 
I want to make the point of using precise language here, because it's important. We are speaking here of "prescribed fire" or "prescribed burning". You will not hear the phrase "controlled burn" in the business, because that phrase is not meaningful. A wildfire that is contained is "controlled" but was not intended. The "prescription" part of a prescribed fire means that it is done to achieve specific goals under specific conditions. It is not at all unusual for those goals to include consuming large fuels such as stumps and logs, which may well smolder for some time after the main body of the fire has ended. This will be written into the prescription and will be mitigated as a spotting hazard as well as communicated through state and local agencies as smoke to not report as new fires. There should be signs along roads as well. The perception from the public is increasingly the number one driver of RX burn planning, as one complaining neighbor can sour a county or state agency to burns for years. Internally, your opinion and those of your neighbors has a huge effect on how those burns are planned. I recommend contacting your local FD or CalFire or maybe even whoever is your local clean air agency and asking what they know about the permitting and planning process. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by how thorough the system has become as regards protecting public safety.
 
Back
Top