Dead Trees Pose 'Apocalyptic' Calif. Wildfire Threat

Reuters via Yahoo! ^ | 10/29/03 | Gina Keating

[dead]

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California fire officials warned on Wednesday that one of the biggest of the wildfires they are fighting could be on the verge of taking an "apocalyptic" turn if it spreads to "a deadline" of diseased and highly flammable trees in the San Bernardino Mountains.

The California Department of Forestry has "maxed out" its resources to keep the rampaging blazes from reaching beetle-killed trees surrounding mountain towns in San Bernardino County, the agency's director Andrea Tuttle told reporters on Wednesday.

There are 400,000 acres of dead and diseased trees in San Bernardino and San Diego Counties, Tuttle said.

"When the fire gets into diseased trees the fire will be of biblical proportions," Tuttle said. Since the trees are dead, they provide perfect fuel for the fires and would produce an intensity of heat and flame not so far seen in the week old battle.

"We are worried. We are trying to hold the fire out of that area, but if it does go up it will be of epic proportions. We will not have seen a conflagration of those proportions once it gets started," she said.

Meanwhile, a Los Angeles County blaze that firefighters had managed to tamp down overnight sprang up ahead of strengthening ocean gusts on Wednesday afternoon, leapt Interstate 5 and made a run for a neighborhood of expensive homes.

Fifty-foot high flames came within feet of homes in the Stevenson Ranch in Los Angeles, and police warned residents and news crews to be prepared to evacuate quickly. Firefighting aircraft dove through thick smoke to aggressively bombard the so-called Simi Valley fire with water and retardant as strong winds buffeted the aircraft.

NINE MAJOR FIRES

Los Angeles County Fire Capt. Mark Savage said about 50 fire engines were positioned throughout Stevenson Ranch to protect the structures. "We are putting in place the plan we have had the whole time: defending the structures as (the fire) bumps into the foothill area," Savage said.

The fires have blackened an area nearly the size of the U.S. state of Rhode Island -- over the course of a week and incinerated 2,000 homes, destroying entire suburban neighborhoods in hours.

Officials said that at least 18 people have died in one of the state's worst-ever wildfire seasons and grimly predicted that more charred bodies would be uncovered when the flames were finally doused and rescue workers moved in.

More than 12,000 firefighters from across California and the western states have been deployed at nine major fires and eight smaller offshoots that have burned more than 600,000 acres from north of Los Angeles to the U.S.-Mexico border, Tuttle said.

She added that the biggest worry remained the so-called Old Fire, which on Wednesday jumped a highway that firefighters hoped would act as a brake and marched through the San Bernardino Mountains to surround some 16 mountain communities about 70 miles east of Los Angeles.

MOUNTAIN TOWN WIPED OUT

More than 50,000 residents of the popular resort towns of Big Bear and Lake Arrowhead jammed the only two roads off the mountain on Tuesday afternoon, fleeing a towering firestorm that caught crews off guard.

In San Diego County, the so-called Cedar fire incinerated 90 percent of the buildings in the mountain hamlet of Cuyamaca, and firefighters were staging a house-by-house effort to save nearby Julian, a former gold-mining town, and seven other communities from the fire's advance.

Tuttle reported that early and incomplete surveys of the burned area showed that 300 structures had been lost in Cuyamaca, where only the town hall and fire station were standing, and at least 200 in Julian.

The two huge fires in San Diego County had destroyed 1,300 homes and killed 12 people. Although diminished desert winds and clearing skies overnight allowed firefighters to make their first progress in containing the 45-mile-long fires, Wednesday afternoon brought renewed gusts from the opposite direction, officials said.

"It's a bad wind for us," CDF regional Chief Tim Turner said.

Gov. Gray Davis estimated that by the time all of the fires were put out the cost to California, which is already reeling from financial woes that prompted voters to throw him out of office, would be nearly $2 billion.

President Bush has declared a state of emergency in four counties, and California Governor-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger visited Washington to meet congressional leaders on Wednesday to hurry the dispersal of federal emergency funds.

[goldstategop]

What's wrong with letting the trees burn down? They're dead and dying anyway and we simply don't have the manpower to chop em all down. Anyways, it can hardly get worse than it is now. We've already been through the worst of the apocalypse.

[Poohbah]

What's wrong with letting the trees burn down?

Nothing, if you don't live adjacent to them...

[Steven W.]

I was watching some mindless exchange between Katie Couric and Tim Russert this AM (emphasis on mindless) and it was clear they were missing the elephant in the room. what's that you ask? after months of threatening fillibusters and lots of overblown hyperbole from her pantsuitedness, Hillary!, the DemoncRATs just gave in quietly yesterday and allowed Gov. of Utah to be confirmed as Bush's choice for EPA secretary. Why is that? mere coincidence? I think not. Me thinks that the environmental issue has turned broadly for the Republicans over the past year, one in which we've seen eco-terrorists burning housing developments and, now, with all the fires and other outright incompetence brought by the liberals in CA government (especially Grayout Davis) - the last thing in the world Californians will want to hear about in next year's election is why we need to be more sympathetic to the now totally homeless gnatcatchers or bark beetles which left the entire California ecosystem in such an unhealthy state of disease and decay, nature came back with a vengeance to correct, undo, refertilize & regerminate the terrible errors wrought by the enviro-wacko's ways.

[dead]

When a fire eats 400,000 acres of dead trees, it's going to really really really big and still out looking for fuel.

Houses, office buildings, cars, and people will do.

[goldstategop]

Oh I agree. Why did the enviro wackos oppose clear cutting in the first place? Then we wouldn't to worry about the possible effects on homes, buildings, cars, and people. That's par for the course in a state in which common sense is the last thing to be found in its environmental policy. So Mother Nature has to take care of what people should have been taking care of in the first place as a result of their own blindness and plain old-fashioned stupidity.

[Libertarianize the GOP]

ping

[theFIRMbss]

>Nothing, if you don't live adjacent to them...

I've been wondering
if in some small way this fire
might be a message

to the noisy, rich
liberals who do live there...
Maybe they'll catch on

that rational use
and clear-cutting of timber
is a good, good thing...

[goldstategop]

Exactly my point. The liberals have learned a VERY expensive lesson. Now let em pay for it.

[dead]

Why did the enviro wackos oppose clear cutting in the first place?

Because they're enviro-wackos, of course.

I hope they can learn their lesson without too much more damage.

The government and insurance companies will pay to rebuild their mansions, and that's coming out of our pockets one way or the other. Plus having your house burn just really sucks, and I wouldn't wish that on anybody, no matter how stupid they are.

[So Cal Rocket]

San Diego, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties are major Republican strongholds.

[KC_for_Freedom]

Now let em pay for it.

I would suggest that they start paying for it by letting Bush pass some forest management legislation and open up federal land for thining.

FOX had a San Francisco liberal on to discuss what should be done, and all he could think of is spend more money (our money) and complained that management of federal land would do little for the brush areas of southern california. But this does show the Sierra Club and liberal management of the environment can have some expensive consequences.

[goldstategop]

Yep, politics at work. If San Francisco were ablaze, I wonder how soon the state government would have acted to deal with the situation.

[Wolfstar]

It was a REALLY mindless exchange. Katie (whose head must be about as empty as a deflated balloon) was almost giggling with glee over all the trouble Arnold Schwarzenegger will inherit from Gray Davis. Thousands of human beings are losing all they worked for, and all that witch can think of is how difficult the fires make it for Arnold to succeed as governor. If that isn't evil in a smiley face, I don't know what is. (I thought Dems were supposed to be the sensitive, care-about-the-little-people party.)

Then, just to reinforce how stupid she is, she had the gall to ask Russert whether Californians will be unhappy with Arnold because he's in Washington instead of back home while the emergency is going on. Well, duh, Katie. NOoo. The man is not governor yet. He's actually more effective back in Washington lobbying for the state than he would be standing around on the sidelines here at home. When Russert began to answer her stupid question in the affirmative, I switched channels. Had about all I could stomach.

[ItsOurTimeNow]

The liberals have learned a VERY expensive lesson.

Ideally, yes.

But you, I, and everyone else here knows that liberals don't learn sh#t from their mistakes. They'll just simply turn around and find some way to blame this on Bush, all the while refusing to admit that it was their own fault.

[sinkspur]

Me thinks that the environmental issue has turned broadly for the Republicans over the past year, one in which we've seen eco-terrorists burning housing developments and, now, with all the fires and other outright incompetence brought by the liberals in CA government

The Republicans OWN the environmental issue, especially after this conflagration in California.

How can anybody oppose clear-cutting now?

These fires belong to the Democrats, a point the Republicans should make for the next twelve months.

[Wolfstar]

Why did the enviro wackos oppose clear cutting...

The problem is that they oppose ANY forest management in favor of letting nature take its course. Clear-cutting isn't necessary if the forests are thinned and managed properly over time.

[SoCal Pubbie]

I'm afraid Perky Katie is in for a big letdown. Taking over a horrible situation like this virtually guarantees that Arnold will be a success as governor. It's like a new coach after a winless season, one victory and you look like a genius.

[tray-sea]

I'm not sure you have to clear cut a forest.. Perhaps I have the meaning of clearcutting wrong. My thought is that as long as we maintain our forests (like the Indians freekin did) we'd be in good shape. I think there is a post somewhere on these wildfire threads about a scientist that said our forests from 400 or so years ago (as documented by explorers) were not soooo dense as some are today b/c we used the timber and they were maintained by the Indians-- that you could in theory ride a horse through the forest easily without a lot problems (like hitting a tree!). Makes you wonder how messed up those enviro whackos really are and how stupid we've been for letting them run their campaigns as if they really want to save the environment.. what's that saying...
THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS..
good going Sierra Club!

California is one big burning Hell right now. Many prayers for those affected by the fires.

[Simmy2.5]

Exactly. Not only that though, these fires are UNNATURALLY out of whack since the ecofrauds allowed the forest to decay without some sort of management before (specifically, cutting down old dead trees which allows the forest to thrive...and if there is a fire...allows the "old growth" trees that the econuts say they are for protecting to surive a fire). At the moment, the entire forest is killed due the EXTREME amount fuel that makes the fires more intese and dangerous. As for all those nutrients? Well, those nutrients in the soil are no good if they are washed away in a rain storm. Something the left seems to forget in the environment debate. For more info...check out