Author: Bill

Ray Dalton, the former mayor of Paradise, California, put up this sign.

Wildfire today covered the Humbolt fire earlier HERE; it burned 74 homes and 23,000 acres. Many of the homes destroyed were in the town of Paradise. Dalton put up the sign after he was told by police about residential burglaries during the evacuations. His home was spared by the fire, unlike many of those around him, but he plans to keep up the sign as a reminder to the gawkers cruising through the neighborhood.

Jay Grivette’s home was one of those burglarized. He is thankful that he had installed a security system that records video of the property which captured images of a white male entering the home. Police later arrested Jose Antonio Hernandez, 20, and charged him with burglary and looting. Evidence was also recovered at Hernandez’s residence.

A photo taken with an infrared camera by Grivette’s security system shows the intruder who broke into his residence.

It’s a shame that Grivette’s home was burglarized, but at least it appears that the scum that broke into his house will be brought to justice.

Photos courtesy of ChicoER.com

The Evans Road fire in eastern North Carolina is going to be with us until a hurricane-style rain event occurs. It takes a lot of water to penetrate into several feet of peat. The size of the fire is being reported as 41,060 acres. The firefighters are still pumping huge quantities of water from nearby lakes onto the fire–19,000 gallons per minute.

In addition to Hendricks Type 2 Incident Management Team, there are two National Incident Management Organization teams on the fire, Custer’s and Whitney’s. There are 476 people working on the fire and it is 40% contained.

Below is a map showing the fire perimeter in yellow–and in red, orange, and black, the heat detected by satellites last night. I have not seen any evidence of the massive burnout operation the fire spokesperson mentioned last week that was going to occur on the east side along highway 94. Click on the map and photo to see larger versions.

The picture below shows a burnout operation on Seagoing Road.
Photo courtesy of InciWeb.

Firegeezer is always a good place to go to read about the broader fire world. You may have noticed on the left side of this page in the “Other Fire Blogs” section, we automatically show an excerpt from his latest post.

He pointed to an interesting story (with cool pictures) on STATer911 about a vehicle fire that melted the vinyl siding on a nearby house. In wildland fire, we emphasize fire safe building materials. Vinyl siding is not fire safe.

Firewise.org advises:

Materials that melt or burn in relatively low temperatures, such as PVC and vinyl siding, should not be used, since they do not provide adequate protection and can melt in the heat of the wildfire.

Indians Fire
On Wednesday a U.S. Forest Service engine from the Los Padres NF was burned over while they were attacking a spot fire. The wind shifted, they were cut off, and three firefighters suffered burn injuries. According to a release from the USFS:

Two received minor burns to their ears; one sustained burns to his ears and serious burns to his hands and was transported to a hospital for further treatment.

All of the firefighters were treated and released at a burn center.

The fire is burning in the Los Padres National Forest in the Ventana Wilderness west of Fort Hunter Liggett and King City. It has been extremely active for the last two days–plume dominated with multiple columns, and has burned 24,818 acres. Some of those acres were very close to the incident command post.

The map shows heat detected by satellites last night in red. The yellow line is the fire perimeter as reported by the Incident Management Team on the fire, showing that the fire has doubled in size since the last perimeter was uploaded. Click on the maps to see larger versions.

Humboldt Fire
This fire is burning near Chico, California and has consumed 22,996 acres and 66 residences. Evacuations for Paradise, Butte Valley and Butte Creek Canyon are in effect, displacing 9,000 residents; 2,877 firefighters and 406 engines are assigned.

The map below shows the fire perimeter as reported by the Incident Management Team at 1800 on June 12.