Sunday, August 25, 2013

Fire Update

It is now 133,980 acres, 7% contained, and inside Yosemite's Northwest boundaries.

I was down in Sacramento yesterday and had the pleasure of watching one of those 747 planes with fire retardant taking off. It was a pretty damn impressive sight.

There are two groves of Giant Sequoia that are unique to that area being threatened. Special effort is being made to protect these groves and rightly so.

To liken the acres to square miles, it's now at 203 square miles about the size of the city of Chicago.

They are expecting 30-40 mile per hour winds down there today, so I suspect tomorrows report will be worse.

Currently 4500 structures are threatened with 23 destroyed.

The fire was also burning toward the Hetch Hetchy reservoir, where San Francisco gets 85 percent of its water, and power for municipal buildings, the international airport and San Francisco General Hospital.



 

Folks, this is not pretty.

Remember, it's only 100 miles South of here. Yeh, it's smoky again this morning. 

Mark

9 comments:

  1. Terrifying! I do hope you get heavy rain or wind changes soon.

    RR

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  2. Is that the view from your home? With the fire 100 miles away? Wow, scary stuff.

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  3. Thanks for the update, Mark. Can't imagine the damage if too much burns in Yosemite. Pray for the Sequoias.

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  4. Unbelievable...although really, it isn't all that unbelievable considering all of the "disasters" man made & natural happening these days... The thing you said comparing it to Chicago, that's incredible. Thoughts going out to all effected (and out there fighting it).

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  5. This is a good time to connect with some Native Americans and get a rain dance going.
    My thoughts are with you all.

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  6. Appreciate the update. Firefighters from Washington are on the scene, including a friend of mine. I'll be following this one. Stay safe.

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  7. Mark
    I have been out of the blog circuit for the past 4 days working with my son-in-law in Tennessee. It is really a sick feeling knowing that this great park is in this kind of danger. I learned to really appreciate these trees when my wife and I saw the great redwoods out that way back in July. Stay safe and thanks for the update

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