Posted on 10/16/2017 8:01:41 AM PDT by Grampa Dave
long Highway 12 through Sonoma Valley, world-famous vineyards beginning to show off their brilliant fall hues are now juxtaposed against a jarring backdrop of mountains blackened by flames.
Majestic parklands ringing the valley have been scarred, including Sugarloaf Ridge State Park and Hood Mountain Regional Park near Kenwood, where flames Sunday continued to send a massive plume of smoke into the sky visible for miles, fueling fresh rivulets of anxiety for both residents and firefighters.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Tom Siragusa, an assistant chief for the San Francisco Fire Department and Petaluma resident who has worked in the fire service for 40 years, said Sunday morning while standing watch with members of his strike team at a home at the end of White Circle Drive in Oakmont.
The hillside home borders the eastern edge of Trione-Annadel State Park, where flames chewed through the undergrowth and came dangerously close to the neighborhood of exclusive estates.
Elsewhere in Sonoma Valley, the rampage continued unabated. Along large swaths of territory and in pockets of small, historic communities, dozens of homes and other structures have been lost and landscapes distorted. This is the new reality, and with evacuation orders still in effect for much of the area, it’s one relatively few people have yet seen.
It will be shocking.
The valley normally hums along on an economy largely built on winemaking and tourism. Both are likely to suffer as a result of fire damage.
Winemaker Steve Ledson said late Sunday his castle-like Highway 12 winery, which has not been damaged by fire despite flames drawing close, remains closed due to power outages. The same is true of his Sonoma hotel and crush facility, which also are closed.
Ledson said his crews have been unable to harvest 100 tons of cabernet grapes hanging on vines on Cavedale Road due to emergency response to fires there. He is working on plans to help his 150 employees financially through this period of unexpected upheaval. But he acknowledged the unavoidable impacts of going without a paycheck for any length of time.
“When they’re not working, how do they pay for their rent and gas? It’s a chain reaction,” Ledson said.
Outside his Highway 12 home near Kenwood on Sunday afternoon, Will Carpenter still appeared dazed as he looked eastward across vineyards at a massive plume of smoke rising above Sugarloaf.
Speaking through a mask covering his mouth, the registered nurse expressed “heartbreak” over the scarring of the beloved parks he and countless others escape to for recreation and quiet.
The sound has been replaced with sirens, the whir of firefighting aircraft and someday soon, hammers and chainsaws.
“It’s going to go from a sleepy little place to a construction zone,” Carpenter said.
On Adobe Canyon Road leading to Sugarloaf, numerous homes have been destroyed by the inferno. Flames still coursed along the hillsides Sunday, bringing fresh anxiety for Harry Trembley.
The Emeryville resident said he spent more than three years building the 2,600-square-foot home on Adobe Canyon Road where his 83-year-old mother lives — and where she has remained despite evacuation orders.
“I’m going to do what I can to defend it,” Trembley said
Thanks, I missed that re: terra cotta. Makes sense.
I don’t know the answer about the relative lifespans of metal vs terra cotta roofs. I know either can outlast comp shingles. Metal, some, TC, a lot. But shingles are typically rated 30 years and start looking bad after 15-20. The metal has to be done correctly (obviously all of them must be installed correctly) or weird condensation problems result. The terra cotta requires substantially heavier framing due to its weight.
Excellent reports above .. thanks ASD.
From the couple I’ve seen in the past, you’re spot on re underbrush + wind only minimally affecting mature trees.
One can only hope that all those impacted are receiving the help they need, politics notwithstanding.
The problem is the rest of the home is vulnerable to embers. The biggest problem is soffits and roof vents. I looked at the google street view of now-charred neighborhoods and the houses were very vulnerable, mainly from very large soffit areas and all kinds of furniture, trash, cars, etc that could burn around them. Their vinyl siding would melt off and then burn, vinyl gutters will melt and burn. The only remedy is hard siding, plugging every hole, screening every vent and soffit with special screening, etc.
They require class A roofs, see my previous post for a link. The roof is not the point of entry for most fires except some of the trendy southern california shake roofs.
Class A shingles will not burn. They do tests with shingle roofs and burn dry debris in the roof valleys and the shingles do not burn.
I lived in northern California SF Bay Area from Fremont to Yountville for 40 years. I know that 29 separate wildfires from Napa north to the Oregon border do not start simultaneously within 3-5 hours and all AT NIGHT. I never heard of such a thing- maybe one or two in the Napa-Berryessa area, but 29? Gimmee a break-
Take a look at this fire map. On Oct 7-8 there were 29 separate fires on that map.
All are in an ellipsoid shaped-pattern like a stretched-out donut with a big hole in the middle with no fires in the middle til at the north end of it toward Oregon border.
http://www.calfire.ca.gov/general/firemaps
Either you`ve got 29 separate arsonists all in communications synchronized to start 29 fires in two 400 mile parallel paths, all angled at 65 degress NW or it`s something else. Gimme a beak- Who starts 29 fires all aligned at 65 degrees NW simultaneously more or less -within 3-5 hours??
Please explain, “How that could be done?”
Or how is it that all 29 fires are started all at 65 degrees NW by power lines? — all within 3-5 hours??. PG&E must really have cruddy wires.
Terra Cotta can be very dangerous.
Firefighters have fallen right through because the framework burns before the tiles.
Or was it not enough framing?
I can’t remember.
I’m not a big fan of terra cotta tiles from the esthetic standpoint. Also, a goofball worker can walk on them the wrong way and break them, which is fine, but they’re not going to tell you nor fix it should they do so.
When it comes to ways to die or get injured dealing with a house fire, there are plenty of ways.
You bring up some excellent questions.
You bring up some excellent questions.
I think they’re attractive, but I would prefer a properly done metal roof.
> Class A shingles will not burn.
In that particular test maybe, but it isn’t conducted under high wind conditions. Once the shingles have been blown off a roof burning from underneath they can then fly from that house to another and literally stick to the walls like a burning fuse.
With those kinds of winds weird things happen.
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