The beautiful weather that southern Californians enjoy throughout much of the year comes with a price at times. This year their Christmas present is a Red Flag Warning for Christmas day and Thursday for areas in Ventura and Los Angeles Counties. The warm, dry, weather with breezy offshore winds will persist through Saturday.
For Christmas day and Thursday weather forecasters are predicting wind gusts of 45 to 50 mph in the mountains and gusts between 35 and 40 in wind prone valleys. Relative humidities will reach into the lower teens by late Wednesday morning and into the single digits on Thursday. These weather conditions paired with extraordinarily dry fuels will produce elevated to critical fire weather conditions.
The Red Flag Warning map was current as of 4:40 p.m. PST on Tuesday. Red Flag Warnings can change throughout the day as the National Weather Service offices around the country update and revise their forecasts.
Thanks go out to Ken
Kern County has their helicopter, 2 bulldozers, and all the stations staffed for Christmas, as SOP. Spent many a holiday like that, and proud of the young guys carrying on the tradition. Merry Christmas!
Christmas Day Red Flag – Angeles National Forest Staffing:
3 Chief Officers (DV1, DV2, BC32)
4 Fire Prevention Patrols (P13, P16, P25, P35)
2 Water Tenders (WT10, WT25)
E112 – Arcadia
E14 – Big Tujunga
E15 – Clear Creek
E18 – Mill Creek
E310 – Little Tujunga
E311 – Angeles Crest
E30 – San Francisquito
E31 – Texas Canyon
E335 – Green Valley
E34 – Oak Flat
E37 – Valyermo
E25 – Lower San Antonio
E26 – Rincon
E27 – Dalton
Merry Christmas!!!
Today, Christmas, there are no federal aircraft on duty in California except for two helicopters that are still assigned to the Pfeiffer Fire at Big Sur. One of those is available for initial attack.
On the other hand, CAL FIRE has at least four air tankers and two helicopters on today. LA County has their usual lineup of helicopters in addition to a Type 1 helicopter and two Scooper air tankers.
In the late 1990’s the same pattern started several fires in Southern California. December 26, just past mid night I was prompted (Cal Fire ECC) to proceed to Stockton Airport (Chinook Co.) and head to Hemet AAB. Spent the day (26th) working fires. The wind subsided the next day 27th about sun down, we were released back to Stockton. The weather was foggy at Stockton which required a ILS approach (instrument) to the airport. During our brief deployment (myself and four guard) we delivered eighteen drops of foam enhanced water, 34,000 gallons. Thanks to Ken for the Angeles staffing.