Station fire likely to hit historic Mt. Wilson observatory, fire officials say

LA Times ^ | August 30, 2009 | Joe Mozingo

[Deo volente]

That’s a great picture! It seems to be updating every few minutes. The fire’s getting very close to the transmitter on the left!

[Ron C.]

Well so much for the updating 12 - links are apparently dumped after 15-20 minutes!

sad to say...

[HiTech RedNeck]

Was thinking of something like a cable hoisted by a helium balloon.

[The Cajun]

This is just nature doing the hard way what people could have done the easy way. People in California need to kick some enviro-wacko ass and start clearing some decent (wide) fire breaks. It would be a hell of a lot easier on the land than what is going on now. Sacrifice a little “pristine” forest or loose the whole damned works every 40 to 50 years....idiocy.

[R_Kangel]

Wow, that’s exactly what I see out my kitchen window with binoculars!!!

[HiTech RedNeck]

Until Congress and the clown legislature in Sacramento back it off, no can do.

[Ron C.]

not a fire - that's a light, been there for hours...

8^)

[jessduntno]

It’s looking pretty serious on the lower part of the hill on the left...the last update looks like it is getting brighter and BIGGER...

[Ancient Drive]

I think the blue tailed squirrel is toast now... 50 yrs in the making.... by brought on by the stupidity of those who thought themselves protectors of the squirrel.

[jessduntno]

Is the line moving behind it in the distance?

[presently no screen name]

Not to mention the two fireman who lost their lives today in LA.

[The Cajun]

Until Congress and the clown legislature in Sacramento back it off, no can do.

Sounds like a job for the people of California whenever they finally get an a$$-full of this type of preventable crap.

[R_Kangel]

Thanx for the info!

Just talked to my son, he spent the day with a forest ranger.....he said it doesn't look good and to prepare for the worst, it is moving fast.....YIKES!!

[Ron C.]

No, the line (also light) has been about the same for over an hour that I've been viewing. (I have to close down the browser, and reload from scratch ever so often to get it to come up. There are likely thousands of people using this one last 'eye' to see if the site burns.

They've 'painted' the area (heavily) around the place with retardant... hopefully, that will be enough.

[jessduntno]

Thanks...

[The Cajun]

Not to mention the two fireman who lost their lives today in LA.

That's the thing which really pisses me off. Those two brave guys were truly worth more as human beings than the entire flock of simple minded enviro-wacko bastards that infest that state or for that matter the entire country.

[Ron C.]

Yeah... post 12 is reloading again! (comes and goes...)

[Ron C.]

Welcome...

The wee white specs on the picture are apparently fragments of ash... the pattern of which has not changed - or increased in the past hour plus... a good sign.

They just might get lucky.

[ArmstedFragg]

There were five more injuries from a camp crew in the last two hours or so, not yet reported.

Wilson’s on the east flank of a fire that’s been moving primarily north for the last day. There is some gradual widening going on, but nothing that’d result in it reaching Wilson in that predicted time period, barring a sudden wind change. There was an attempt made to pre-treat the west side of Wilson this afternoon that was partially successful. I’m guessing it’ll still be standing tomorrow.

Channel 2 has been intermittantly running a live camera located at the transmitter building on their streaming coverage at http://cbs2.com/. It gives a more accurate picture of the situation than the telescope webcam does.

And, just for what it’s worth, I once worked for a TV station in a similar location. The fire blew through, torched one unlucky station, and left everybody else intact. Biggest problem turned out to be keeping the generators running ‘til the power came back on.

[Ron C.]

Uh Oh... whole left side of picture starting to turn orange, that means fire is much closer now!