It happened on rain-slickened Interstate 5 in Southern California Saturday morning
(Above: photo by LA County FD)
Eight first responders were injured and one was killed in Southern California Saturday morning while they were assisting at the scene of a vehicle rollover on Interstate 5. The person killed was a member of the Ventura County search-and-rescue team.
Below is an excerpt from the LA Times published at 10:50 a.m local time on Saturday:
Los Angeles County firefighters were assisting the sheriff’s department with the rollover crash that left first responders “severely” injured. Three of those hurt in the were members of the Fillmore search-and-rescue team, the sheriff’s department said.
The group was on its way to Mt. Pinos for a training exercise when they saw a crash on the freeway and stopped to help, the sheriff’s department said.
“While they were assisting people, a vehicle plowed into the scene,” Ventura County Sheriff’s Sgt. Eric Buschow said.
The Fillmore Mountain Search and Rescue Team is composed of a group of “highly skilled volunteers” who respond to wilderness emergencies in Ventura County, Buschow said.
Our sincere condolences go out to the families, coworkers, and friends of the victims.
Photo by Los Angeles County Fire Department, February 2, 2019.
The number of acres burned and the total number of fires decreased in 2018 from 2017
While the number of wildfires and the total acres burned both declined in 2018 the average size continued to increase. The number of wildfires has been trending down since at least 1985 and the average size has been increasing. There are variations in the number of acres burned from year to year roughly in five to six-year cycles, but in the late 1980s the average size of a wildfire in the U.S. was 30 acres. That number has increased every decade since, bringing the average for this decade (to date) up to 101 acres.
The number of acres burned and the total number of fires decreased in 2018 from 2017 by 13 and 22 percent respectively, while the acres burned was sixth highest since records have been kept.
If the five to six-year cycle for burned acres that we noticed in the data is real, and continues, we could expect lower numbers for the next three to four years beginning in 2019 compared to 2017 and 2018.
The raw data we used to construct these charts is from the National Interagency Fire Center, current as of December 21, 2018. The historical data for Alaska before 1990 which we used to determine the numbers for the other 49 states is from a paper published by the University of Alaska.
Wildfire potential in United States is expected be normal or below normal in most areas during the coming four months
After missing the January edition of the monthly fire potential outlook due to the shutdown of the Departments of Interior and Agriculture, today the Predictive Services section at the National Interagency Fire Center issued their Wildland Fire Potential Outlook for February through May. The data represents the cumulative forecasts of the ten Geographic Area Predictive Services Units and the National Predictive Services Unit.
If their analysis is correct, the wildfire potential for United States will be normal during the coming four months, except it will be below normal for most of the South and above normal for Hawaii.
The format of the written outlook has recently evolved. Verbiage about past weather and fuel conditions over the previous 30 to 60 days is more prominent along with descriptions for what is normal for the present and near future. Forecasts for what land managers will be faced with in the coming months are still in the document, and can be found in the sections for each geographic area.
Below:
An excerpt from the NIFC narrative report for the next several months;
More of NIFC’s monthly graphical outlooks;
NOAA’s three-month temperature and precipitation forecasts; and,
Drought Monitor.
Here is one section that discusses El Niño:
“Impacts from a fading El Niño event on late winter and spring weather conditions vary. They typically result in below average snowpack across the northwestern quarter of the nation and above average snowpack across the central portion of the West. The southern tier of the nation tends to experience wetter than average conditions, except possibly across West Texas which can be drier than average. The northern tier of the nation can be warmer than average which would promote a faster melting rate of the snowpack in the mountains across the Pacific Northwest and the Northern Rockies.”
Pyrocumulus north of Timbarra, Victoria, Australia. Murray King took the photo 30km west of the fire in Bindi, East Gippsland on January 25, 2019 at 5:30 p.m.
Murry King sent us this photo of the pyrocumulus cloud over a bushfire north of Timbarra, Victoria, Australia. He got the shot from a point 30km west of the fire in Bindi, East Gippsland on January 25, 2019 at 5:30 p.m.
Thanks Murry.
Here is the latest information about the fire from Vic Emergency:
This Advice message is being issued for Timbarra, Gillingall, Gelantipy, Butchers Ridge, W-Tree, Murrindal, Buchan and Buchan South.
There is an active bushfire north of Timbarra and Gillingall and west of the Gelantipy Road between Butchers Ridge and W-Tree that is not yet under control.
We have now started igniting a back burn on the south eastern corner of the fire near W-Tree, along Hodges Track and Dawson Track. If conditions are favourable, we will continue to extend the back burn later today.
There will be increased smoke in this area. Crews and machinery continue to strengthen containment lines around the fire perimeter.
Fire near Yellow Dog Road in Tate County, Mississippi, January 30, 2019. Photo by Bill Gabbert. Click to enlarge.
A grass fire burned a couple of acres today near a home at Yellow Dog Road in Tate County Mississippi before Senatobia Fire & Rescue knocked it down.
Fire near Yellow Dog Road in Tate County, Mississippi, January 30, 2019. Photo by Bill Gabbert.Fire near Yellow Dog Road in Tate County, Mississippi, January 30, 2019. Photo by Bill Gabbert.Fire near Yellow Dog Road in Tate County, Mississippi, January 30, 2019. Photo by Bill Gabbert.
On Wednesday, the day after Pacific Gas and Electric officially filed for bankruptcy protection, a federal judge berated the company for wildfires started by their electrical distribution equipment.
“To my mind, there’s a very clear-cut pattern here: that PG&E is starting these fires,” Judge William Alsup said. “What do we do? Does the judge just turn a blind eye and say, continue your business as usual. Kill more people by starting more fires.'” And later, “Safety is not your number one thing”.
PG&E has been on criminal probation for years following the 2010 gas line explosion in the San Francisco Bay Area that killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes. Judge Alsup is overseeing the company’s probation.
Investigators have attributed more than 1,500 fires to PG&E power lines and hardware between June 2014 and December 2017, according to the Wall Street Journal (subscription).
Below is an excerpt from KCRA:
[Alsup] proposed earlier this month as part of PG&E’s probation that it remove or trim all trees that could fall onto its power lines in high-wind conditions and shut off power when fire is a risk regardless of the inconvenience to customers or loss of profit. Alsup said his goal was to prevent PG&E equipment from causing any wildfires during the 2019 fire season.
PG&E wrote in a court filing last week that the judge’s proposals would endanger lives, could cost $75 to $150 billion to implement, and require the hiring of 650,000 workers.
From the Merced Sun Star:
Alsup, however, was clearly frustrated by PG&E’s explanations. “I don’t buy that there isn’t enough people,” the judge said, adding that PG&E is moving too slowly and wasted billions paying dividends to shareholders instead of removing trees and improving its system.
What does California law require?
The California Public Resources Code section 4293e requires all vegetation to be removed that is within four to 10 feet of a power line, depending on the how many volts it is carrying. The Code also requires the removal of “dead trees, old decadent or rotten trees, trees weakened by decay or disease, and trees or portions thereof that are leaning toward the line which may contact the line from the side or may fall on the line.”
November 2, 2017 edition of PG&E’s “Currents”. Screen capture from Wayback Machine on November 20, 2017.
Our Opinion
It seems odd, to say the least, that PG&E now seems surprised and outraged that a judge is suggesting that the company “remove or trim all trees that could fall onto its power lines in high-wind conditions”, which is exactly what the law requires, and which was acknowledged by the company in their newsletter three weeks after their electrical system started a dozen fires in Northern California on October 8, 2017, according to CAL FIRE investigators. The agency is also looking into PG&E power line equipment failures that may have caused the Camp Fire on November 8, 2018. Over 40 people died in the Northern California fires, and 86 perished in the Camp Fire which also destroyed more than 14,000 homes.
