Still Smokey

[Vaughn]

Nice sunrise in clean air...for a short while.

The Western Section of the August Complex (total: 880,000 acres, 47% contained) is picking up with the dry hot weather returning and evacuation notices are back in force. This is approaching/at the SE corner of Humboldt County.

The Red Salmon Complex to my east and north in the county is approaching 120,000 acres and is 31% contained. From the latest report on planned Forest Service activities: "Provide point protection along the Salmon River Road corridor for defendable structures." That shows the importance of maintaining good clearance around one's home/property!

Smoke from both fires are heading my way, though right now it is all atmospheric (not on ground level). The light is reddish yellow again after several days break and some light rain.

[Drew Wiley]

Yesterday the wind shift brought the smell of burning grass, evidently from south of my hometown in lower elevation areas of the Kings River, where they're simply allowing that branch of the Creek Fire to slowly burn itself out. It's uninhabited, though they've evacuated some little towns still further down, including the Reservation. There are incredible series of little waterfalls in the steep side canyons, which I doubt anyone besides myself has ever photographed; but all that will recover very quickly from the fire, and the first really wet year will probably produce an incredible poppy bloom. At the north end, the fire has bottlenecked around the junction of the Middle and North Forks of the San Joaquin, where the Lion Fire of several years ago has deprived this fire of fuel. But it burned clear across the Granite Creek Bench and all the trailheads originating there. That will recover much more slowly, longer than I'll have time to witness, starting with a lot of opened up meadows. A bit of that more pitchy forest smell started arriving late last night, but it's nowhere near as bad as before. Mars was the reddest red I've ever seen it last night, but at least I could see it. Right now I'm more worried about noxious creosote-laden brush smoke arriving from the Helena and Calistoga area, if the wind shifts south.

[Vaughn]

The Red Salmon Complex is on land classified as timber land. The August Complex Western Zone is lower elevation and is more of a mix of grassland (and grass farms), manzanita, oak and conifer forests. In that fire, live embers were documented landing 8 miles ahead of the active fire front yesterday.

[Drew Wiley]

There are certain WSA's (Wilderness Study Areas) up there that it's hard to find much information on, although they've obviously been hit hard by fire.

[Andrew O'Neill]

After over a week of smoke from fires south of the Canada/US border, I hope we don't get any more! My brother, way out in Saskatchewan, said they even got some.

[Drew Wiley]

Currently in northern Calif is the largest "fire complex" in State history, now well over 800,000 acres, at the same time as the largest single-point-source fire, occurring in the Southern Sierra, at almost 300,000 acres. What has confused me is why there was not a dual classification of fires like that when I was young, when across the same River lower down there was a fire of over 400,000 acres, but which for sake of the records they divided into several smaller fires. But the probable reason is that it was due to the arsonist setting at least two or three fires just a few miles apart from one another, so that they'd deliberately merge into a far bigger one. People died. By accounting them as separate fires, the authorities could charge him with multiple counts of arson, and overall, lock him up for life. Something very similar happened on a rural road near here this summer. Somebody lit 13 fires in a row along a rural road, and they charged him with 13 counts of arson for sake of a very stiff sentence. There were two similar incidents earlier in the month, so that was one dangerous guy indeed.

[John Kasaian]

A friend who works up there says Yosemite Valley is incredible right now. No crowds. Animals have come down from the high country, little smoke and blue skies. The water falls have petered out, which is normal this time of year.

[Drew Wiley]

All it will take is a shift in the wind to bring the smoke back. But October is that month winds typically go from inland toward the coast, rather than the other way around, like in summer. Not too bad here on the Bay today, but miserable a bit further inland.The risk of more fires is very high statewide.

[Vaughn]

A friend who works up there says Yosemite Valley is incredible right now. No crowds. Animals have come down from the high country, little smoke and blue skies. The water falls have petered out, which is normal this time of year.

Might head down that way after the first good sets of rain.

[Drew Wiley]

I'd love to photograph some of the burnt areas sometime later, but not during the messy clean-up phase when nobody superfluous should be around anyway. I've had it with smoke. Even my little old lady cat is having issues with the air.

[Vaughn]

I have in the past -- have a set of 16x20s of burn areas in Yosemite. Nice light and all, but not that interested in showing them.

[BrianShaw]

I wish they’d stop with just the “complex” names and remind us of the county, nearest town, etc. The news seem to have an aversion to maps.

Where I am we’ve had clear air for a couple of weeks but still cleaning up deposited soot.

[Drew Wiley]

The CalFire Incident site gives very detailed daily maps.

[BrianShaw]

Thanks. Appreciate the suggestion! I’ll find that site. The news just doesn’t give me what I want.

[Vaughn]

I wish they’d stop with just the “complex” names and remind us of the county, nearest town, etc. The news seem to have an aversion to maps...

A "Complex" is two or more fires that had their own names but have merged into one fire. I do not believe they repeat fire names. The August Complex was named after the fact it was started by lightening in August. But it is so big, they have broken it into sections, using compass points, so it is the Western Zone that has just caused evacuation orders in the upper portion of the watershed I live near the bottom of (rivers run south to north up here).

If you would like town names, Ruth (and Ruth Lake/Dam which is 100,000 folks' water supply). Also Mad River, Zenia and Kettenpom. This fire started so far away from these towns, that giving the fire a 'local' name would not be very helpful.

But at this point we have a lot of big fires burning -- all too big.

https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/

Edited to add. Things were looking a little better, but now have thick smoke at ground level making its way down the Mad River along with general arrival. And a bunch of ash has arrived.

[Roger Thoms]

The Glass fire is another bad one, started in the Napa Valley a day ago and has burned over to Santa Rosa, Ca.

https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2020/9/27/glass-fire/

Roger

[Drew Wiley]

We started smelling smoke from the Glass Fire this evening. Its got that more toxic burning suburbia smell, full of plastic fumes and yellow ash. Hope the wind keeps blowing most of that smoke offshore, because it looks like they're not going to able to stop that fire anytime soon. Those folks up in the Wine Country have gotten hit awfully hard these past several years, but it's almost inevitable, given the nature of the brush and very dry wind patterns this time of year. Everyone wants a nice view of the vineyards down in bottomland, but that means development up on adjacent hills where the hazard is. And even if the vineyards themselves survive, the grape taste changes due to smoke. Some of them have already had to convert from making wine to making distilled spirits which don't use the grape skin itself.

[tgtaylor]

I wish they’d stop with just the “complex” names and remind us of the county, nearest town, etc. The news seem to have an aversion to maps.


The IQAir site will show where the fires are located in the area selected - just expand outward 3 times to show the fires on the map. They are indicated with an appropriate "flame" icon on the expanded map with 1, 2 or 3 flames designating the severity of the fire. Click on a flame and its current details will be displayed along with the map coordinates. "Complexes" are identified with halos; click down on a halo to see the separate the individual fires and click on the details for the current conditions. Many 1 flames are satellite discoveries.

[Peter Mounier]

The news seem to have an aversion to maps.
I've been looking at www.caltopo.com
You can put different layers over a base map and there's a slider to gradually fade the top layer revealing the base map below. Different layers include google imagery, contours, streets, fire activity, fire history, wind direction and others. And if you sign in with google, facebook, yahoo, microsoft or apple id you can save the map with your custom layers and share the url.

[Vaughn]

Looks to be one of those days of the sun being just a pale orange disk. No sunrise today.

[Drew Wiley]

All sneezy and brown this morning, but now with bits of marine blue air sneaking in. Don't know what to expect. It seems like mixed smoke sources now, from both the Sierra and North Bay. Some iconic structures outside of Santa Rosa which they spent so much effort to save two years ago are now completely gone. I don't know what would have prevented it except preemptive control burns earlier in the season; but those are almost impossible to safely implement in what are now suburbanized rather than open areas. Control burns worked great around little country towns like the one I grew up near to. The whole town as well as the Forest Service would show up for an annual burn in June. Ironically, a number of the old historic structures uphill from there burnt down during mid-winter deep snows; somebody from the city would buy a quaint old place and not realize that burning pitchy pine wood in the fireplace leads to creosote build up, and results in a chimney fire. I probably can't even work in the darkroom today because I don't want to turn the air exchanger on.

[tgtaylor]

A glimmer of hope buried in this mornings forecast:

If you did happen to look at the satellite and see clear skies
over the Bay Area did you notice the hurricane spinning SW of
Baja? Hurricane Marie quickly intensified and was upgraded to a
category 4 hurricane yesterday. Why is this important for our
weather? Well, for several days now extended model guidance has
tracked the hurricane northward through early next week. By the
middle of next week the hurricane will have likely weakened but
the moisture associated with it remains. Farther north in the
Pacific a robust upper level trough begins to deepen and move
toward the PacNW. The leftover tropical moisture has a good shot
at getting pulled northward and absorbed into the trough. The
latest 00Z models bring a frontal boundary through the region next
Friday/Saturday (Oct 9/10). Ensemble guidance, which is a good
metric to use that far out, is showing a 15-20% chance for
measurable rain. Some of the operational runs are showing
impressive rainfall amounts at 0.5-1". Obviously a forecast at
over 180+ hours out will change a lot, but confidence is
increasing for at least some wet weather late next week.

So the next question becomes, what does the rain do to the ongoing
fire situation? If it plays out that rain does occur it will
definitely aid in the firefighting efforts, but will it totally
end the fire season? Probably not. A proxy that is used to define
a season ending event is 0.5-0.75" of rain in 5 day or less. Given
the state of the fuels if it does rain it may be more of a season
slowing event. It`s all speculation at this point, but wanted to
mention it nonetheless.

[Tin Can]

as i use black mode, all your posts are unreadable with blue text


A glimmer of hope buried in this mornings forecast:

If you did happen to look at the satellite and see clear skies
over the Bay Area did you notice the hurricane spinning SW of
Baja? Hurricane Marie quickly intensified and was upgraded to a
category 4 hurricane yesterday. Why is this important for our
weather? Well, for several days now extended model guidance has
tracked the hurricane northward through early next week. By the
middle of next week the hurricane will have likely weakened but
the moisture associated with it remains. Farther north in the
Pacific a robust upper level trough begins to deepen and move
toward the PacNW. The leftover tropical moisture has a good shot
at getting pulled northward and absorbed into the trough. The
latest 00Z models bring a frontal boundary through the region next
Friday/Saturday (Oct 9/10). Ensemble guidance, which is a good
metric to use that far out, is showing a 15-20% chance for
measurable rain. Some of the operational runs are showing
impressive rainfall amounts at 0.5-1". Obviously a forecast at
over 180+ hours out will change a lot, but confidence is
increasing for at least some wet weather late next week.

So the next question becomes, what does the rain do to the ongoing
fire situation? If it plays out that rain does occur it will
definitely aid in the firefighting efforts, but will it totally
end the fire season? Probably not. A proxy that is used to define
a season ending event is 0.5-0.75" of rain in 5 day or less. Given
the state of the fuels if it does rain it may be more of a season
slowing event. It`s all speculation at this point, but wanted to
mention it nonetheless.

[Drew Wiley]

Don't expect serious rain anytime soon. October is usually an especially dry month, and especially fire prone. I'll be happy just to get a break in the smoke long enough for some exercise. It looks like just about everything brush-related that didn't burn in the wine country the last round is doing so this time. That fact should by itself provide something of a reprieve in that region at least for awhile until the brush builds up again, and everyone has forgotten its risk. Building codes will be revised demanding more fire-resistant construction. But the somewhat inland hot geography made all that chaparral and scrub pine especially vulnerable. The repeated heavy economic hits to the area are going to be hard to recover from, especially with respect to tourism.
I'm guardedly more optimistic about what happened up in my old back yard of the San Joaquin canyons. If that Creek Fire was an utter monster down in the canyon and amidst all the beetle-killed forest of mid-elevation, it seems to have progressed more naturally above 7000 ft to the north, and might have simply cleared out a lot of deadfall tamarack and so forth, more like a typical lightning fire would have done. A lot of enclosed zone on the maps is actually quite cliffy, so wouldn't have been affected much; and of course, everything around timberline and above would be immune. But that's all quite a different scenario in what is largely either official or de facto wilderness, from the North Bay, where the tentacles of unwise development have spread far and wide.

[Vaughn]

That's some my hope in the Yolla Bollys -- isolated pockets, protected by recent fires and landforms...the whole wilderness is marked in red. My access points are also burnt, so we'll see if I ever do get back in there. August Complex is almost at one million acres at 51% contained. Firefighters yesterday working to save multiple homes were called off to help transport people out of the fire area who had ignored the evacuation orders. A cannabis crop and/or 'your rights' are not worth it.

[Drew Wiley]

Who needs cannabis when poison oak leaves can be smoked instead, which don't even need any herbicides or pirated water? In fact, it's one of the primary pioneering species after a burn. ... I briefly talked with a Shasta NF manager last month, who told me that most of that area's illegal pot is going to Wisconsin and Indiana.

[Vaughn]

In other news -- Yosemite will end the day-use reservation system put into place due to Covid19 on November 1, 2020.

10-4-2020

Another day of good air, but we have been 'promised' a shift in the wind and that will change tonight as smoke comes in from the east. I should have taken advantage of the break and got out more. However I am in the middle of cleaning up my dimroom spaces so that I can do some negative development and platinum printing. Between the smoke, ash and the summer-long construction just down wind from me -- and the lack of air filtration in my old place -- everything is a mess! My house backs up to an old railroad right-of-way that is being converted into a trail through town...pretty cool.

Some rain in the forecast for the weekend...the last storm we were on the southern edge and got little, so hopefully we'll get a touch more this time.

10-5-2020

I hate being right -- smoke is back...climbed up to "Unhealthy", but my bathroom/dimroom is cleaned -- just got to put everything back in and together for tonight.

[Andrew O'Neill]

Smoke is still making its way up here... albeit thinner, today.

[Drew Wiley]

Finally got blue sky, headed across the bridge toward the redwoods, and then snapped a fan belt just before Skywalker Ranch, where I pulled over onto trailhead parking waiting to get towed. At least it was a pretty spot. But there goes another one of our few clean air days. They say no actual rain will reach us this weekend; but at least the smoke getting pushed away for awhile is encouraging.

[Vaughn]

We might get a third of an inch - what we got from the last storm that went to the north of us. They were originally saying we might get an inch....but the amount predicted kept dropping thru the week. It will help our fire situation. The air has finally cleaned up a bit since this morning. Still unbreathable in places inland.

[Drew Wiley]

Except for a 60 acre grass fire 15 mi away, we've had blue sky for the past 4 days. But I can't even walk up the street to the open space till the weekend due to red flag dry wind alerts. They've done a really good job clearing away all the grass and downfall in the eucalyptus groves near town, have re-graded the fire roads, and even train fire crews there. Plus there's an 8-lane freeway between the park and my place, which means our own neighborhood is exempt from deliberate power shutdowns during anticipated red flag conditions. Surviving being eaten by the three little wannabee mountain lions lounging in the back lawn right now is a different topic. But so far, they've been more interested in catching butterflies.

[John Kasaian]

In Fresno it all depends on which way the wind is blowing.
An owl rode shotgun in a chopper dropping water on the Creek fire
https://www.yourcentralvalley.com/news/local-news/unheard-of-owl-rides-shotgun-as-helicopter-pilot-fights-creek-fire-below/

[Tin Can]

Midwest got light rain today, it has been very dry and brush fires were happening near me

Tonight first frost

[Drew Wiley]

Don't know why there were seemingly two different chopper pictures on that link, John. The small yellow one was obviously parked at the Mammoth airport on the backside of the range, which didn't look like a rig capable of heavy water-carrying. The owl appeared to be on a big khaki colored chopper instead.

[John Kasaian]

As if helicopter flying owls aren't enough, Yosemite has a singing bear
https://youtu.be/xD6FH0oN_KI

[Drew Wiley]

Three raccoons managed to break into a bank the other nite through the ducting. They look like bandits, so why not? The air has been so clear here due to the winds, no fog, and lack of road and air traffic, and reduced port shipping, that last night I could plainly see the sphere of Mars using just binoculars. That might be easy in the mountains or desert, but it's darn rare here.

[John Kasaian]

Three raccoons managed to break into a bank the other nite through the ducting. They look like bandits, so why not? The air has been so clear here due to the winds, no fog, and lack of road and air traffic, and reduced port shipping, that last night I could plainly see the sphere of Mars using just binoculars. That might be easy in the mountains or desert, but it's darn rare here.

Were you able to watch any of the meteor shower?

[Drew Wiley]

No, John. The fog did move back in.

[John Kasaian]

We went to Mariposa on HWY 49 yesterday.
A low pressure area is coming in.
The air was pretty nice and the sky blue-ish.
It all depends on the wind direction.

[Drew Wiley]

I just can't win. Had another nice blue day when I got up yesterday. I had already been over to Pt Reyes the day before for a walk, and red flag restrictions were beginning; so I went to the darkroom for a long session, and after awhile my lungs started getting irritated, and I couldn't figure out why. It was just ordinary black and white chemistry and the exhaust system was on. I didn't know till afterwards when I turned on the evening news that an oil tanker truck had flipped on the freeway nearby, completely burned, and shut the freeway down all day.

[reddesert]

FWIW I was camping and hiking in Yosemite from Oct 26-31. At the beginning on Oct 26 it was noticeably hazy in the Valley and at night there were many visible particles in a flashlight beam, as if downwind from a campfire. Hiking out to higher elevation, it seemed like the haze was strongest at lower elevations. Not sure there was an actual inversion layer trapping it, but there was no smoke in a flashlight beam in Little Yosemite Valley (6100 feet ASL) or up at 9000 feet. Blue sky for several days while hiking, but in longer distance views such as from famous viewpoints, it was still clearly hazier than usual.

[Drew Wiley]

Its very clear on the coast now, but the bit of haze that drifts in is still from the seemingly endless Creek Fire above my hometown, where it's still working its way around cliffs and meadows at both high altitude and down in the canyon. Only heavy rain or snow will put it out completely. Yosemite Valley itself is not very high at all at the Valley floor. Smoke and smog settles in there from all over the place, including a couple of slowly smoldering burns they still have in the Park itself.
I'm waiting for the first good rain before I run up there. The mandated reservation system was lifted Nov 1st, so you can just drive in now. My nephew and his wife just last week hiked to the summit of Mt Dana above Tioga Pass and sent me snapshots. Some haze in every direction.

[John Kasaian]

We're eagerly awaiting rain this week end, and the snow level is predicted to be at 4,000'.
The big issue right now is getting the toxic mess from all the burned cabins in the Creek Fire abated before it contaminates the watershed.

[Drew Wiley]

Much of the watershed was ruined long before simply by resort development peripheral to Shaver without proper effluent control. Suds were going down into the creeks where once there had been huge native rainbow trout and wonderfully clear swimming holes beneath a series of tall waterfalls, if one wanted to risk getting to those. I could hypothetically do a whole exhibition of large format prints from that area, probably knew its secrets better than anyone else alive. There were also incredible very ancient archaeological sites, which I won't give details on, as well as lot of old logging artifacts, some of which our family has preserved.
The burnt pines will look like a mess for awhile, but there are lots of intervening patches of bare rock and streambed which have always had wonderful Springtime wildflowers, and now will no doubt have even greater displays of the kind of flowers which typically follow fires. I feel sorry for the mountain lions; huge ones used to use the bowl-shaped terrain to get the advantage from above over deer taking paths down toward streams and meadow forage. Now they'll have less cover. I don't have any plans to visit until there's a bit of new start of vegetation, a Spring or two away.
The cold wind is just now starting to arrive here. No problem. I figured I'd have to make due with MF gear this weekend anyway due to wind. If it turns too cold, I'll just switch on the drymount press and do those kinds of chores - no need for a separate heater! Actual rain is unlikely.

[John Kasaian]

Much of the watershed was ruined long before simply by resort development peripheral to Shaver without proper effluent control. Suds were going down into the creeks where once there had been huge native rainbow trout and wonderfully clear swimming holes beneath a series of tall waterfalls, if one wanted to risk getting to those. I could hypothetically do a whole exhibition of large format prints from that area, probably knew its secrets better than anyone else alive. There were also incredible very ancient archaeological sites, which I won't give details on, as well as lot of old logging artifacts, some of which our family has preserved.
The burnt pines will look like a mess for awhile, but there are lots of intervening patches of bare rock and streambed which have always had wonderful Springtime wildflowers, and now will no doubt have even greater displays of the kind of flowers which typically follow fires. I feel sorry for the mountain lions; huge ones used to use the bowl-shaped terrain to get the advantage from above over deer taking paths down toward streams and meadow forage. Now they'll have less cover. I don't have any plans to visit until there's a bit of new start of vegetation, a Spring or two away.
The cold wind is just now starting to arrive here. No problem. I figured I'd have to make due with MF gear this weekend anyway due to wind. If it turns too cold, I'll just switch on the drymount press and do those kinds of chores - no need for a separate heater! Actual rain is unlikely.

Wind blowing over burnt trees up there is going to be another hazard with the wind we're having now

[Drew Wiley]

Not many tall trees were left prior to the latest fire. Most of it was all logged in the 1880's, then again in the 1950's- 60's. There were a number of lovely old golden oaks around 3500 to 4500 ft elevation range which might have be killed, but they don't uproot as easily. A lot of beetle dead sugar pine on the Courtright Road, but that's the one route the utility companies did a got job with brush control, in their own interest. The massive red fir and lodgepole district which heavily burned is between Kaiser Ridge and Lake Edison; but nobody lives there. Hopefully snow will stop any ongoing burning along the north perimeter of Edison Lk itself. Across the River in Madera County is a different story. But the cabins in Beasore Mdw dodged the bullet. Hard to say how bad the damage really is up around Granite Creek; but not much beyond the trailhead toward the Clark Range seems to have been affected. Up toward the lovely Granite Creek Niche and past Cora Lks and down into the Canyon is is another story; but there are quite a few meadows in there, so maybe the damage was hop-scotch. The west side of Madera Pk below timberline looks like it got hit pretty hard. I should ask my other nephew if he has seen that side of the SW Clark Range directly, but he had enough worries of his own due to a closer fire above Mariposa.

[John Kasaian]

I had to have a graft in my jaw.
The periodontist wanted to use cadaver material.
I told him I didn't want no dead guy in my mouth, so he agreed to use bovine material instead.
Last week end we took a little drive to the mountains to check out the fire damage.
On the way up we passed a pasture full of heifers.
It was just like being at a family reunion!:o

[Tin Can]

A very good sense of humour!

[Jim Noel]

I had cadaver material replacing a thumb joint until it died again after 10 years. It was recently replaced with tendon material from my body. At 91 i'm not predicting long life for this replacement either.
Let's all have a good day and enjoy all those we have left.

[Drew Wiley]

John - I finally got a full update from the family who bought my house. It was slightly below the fire. But when they were all helicopter rescued out of Edison Lake and then couldn't even return home, they all caught covid (the first cases of people I personally know at this point), plus smoke inhalation hospitalization, and are just now starting to feel normal again. But since their business is going to be directly involved in the reconstruction phase uphill, and now snow itself is going to dramatically impede that process even if the side roads get cleared, they have quite a challenge ahead in terms of work load. Good for business, bad for stress, just trying to put all their ducks in a row again.

[tgtaylor]

One never knows Jim. 20 or 25 years back I remember reading about a guy in Paris in his early 50's. Apartments are hard to get there and he made a deal with this lady in her late 80's or early 90's to pay her rent and he would get her apartment when she passed away. She lived until well into her 100's and he passed first.