Sat 15 Nov 2008
The Southland is on fire again. In the last few days the Santa Ana winds kicked up again, drying up the air, giving people allergy symptoms, knocking over my little avocado tree next to our front door. The last time the Santa Ana winds were here some weeks ago, the quantity of fires in Southern California sapped our state’s emergency funds and worried all homeowners, residents and allergy sufferers. I thought fire “season” was over with, seeing as how November’s seasonal designation should be “Thanksgiving,” right? 🙁
There are multiple fires burning right now, and this time a lot closer to home. Specifically, it’s burning in the city immediately east of my house (Brea) and the next city over (Yorba Linda), and as houses burn, people are evacuated. I text-messaged my tenants to make sure they’re okay. There’s also another fire in Anaheim Hills, which is the one you see in my cellphone photos. 8,000 acres have burned so far, and the fire supposedly started in Corona (near Dwaine) and went west from there. The fire jumped a major freeway artery and burned on at the other side as freeways linking my parents’ city to my old city to our current city are shut down. Many homes have been lost; the Santa Ana winds, being dry and fast, has been carrying burning embers up to a mile away and landing elsewhere, starting another fire.
I’m just watching the TV biting my fingernails, texting people and making sure people in the path of smoke or fire have checked in with me. I texted my godson (Gym Trainee’s boy Evan), who reported that it was scary where he is 50+ miles away with ashes and smoke in the air; the smell is entering their house. I asked if he had his inhaler nearby just in case. He responded that it was in his pocket. 🙁 The news reporter just said that firefighters are trying to use residents’ garden hoses to save as many homes as possible, but the winds are so hot and whipping that they’d just pick up an ember and light another house on fire, and it was impossible to determine which house would be next. 🙁
I got your text pictures–how close is this to you? I hope those winds die down…that sound scary.
They’re not really showing a lot of coverage about this on our local stations, so I have to go to CNN or something.
RAIN RAIN RAIN….. you need RAIN.
It’s not really threatening our home, but unfortunately my old hometown (where MOH Vicky current resides along with my parents and most of our California relatives) of Diamond Bar is ALL OVER THE NEWS. 🙁 My aunt/uncle have been evacuated; Vicky’s awaiting evacuation orders any moment now. Mandatory evacuations ahve been ordered up to a BLOCK of my parents’ house.
It’s also pretty close to where i’m at. When I came home yesterday there were cars parked all along my street and people with cameras taking pictures of the hills. My guess are they were some of the evacuees trying to see how the fire is going. The fire was just 1 freeway exit north of the mall, and the freeway was closed off. Thats only a few miles away from where I’m at. It got pretty smoky here yesterday.
They are not talking about the fires here much either. I hope they contained them better today.
James – I STILL smell smoke to this day when I go to work. I can imagine how bad it was for you when the fires were raging on the weekend.
Flat Coke – I think I heard that one of the fires was 90% contained as of this morning. There’s no more smoke on the horizons, finally.
i heard about it but i wasn’t home at all to really know all the 411. i just hope everyone’s fine. i sent V a brief msg to make sure she’s ok 🙂
for the record re the blogging slump, look at how many readers u still have here! i don’t have as many at all. they would surely all miss u, including myself 🙂
let’s get together when i get back k? i’ve really been needing a friend lately.
anny – The fires in the southland are finally out, and now replaced by thunderstorms. All the areas evacuated last week due to the fires are now again being evacuated due to possible mudslides, now that the brush and root systems keeping hillsides in place are burned off. Some people are having lousy Thanksgivings.
I’ll see you when you get back! =)