Climate Change? Nahhh ...

I remember going there on a Boy Scout camping trip. Redwoods are resilient by nature, particularly to fire. Let's hope that's the case.

 

I spent a weekend there camping with my then girlfriend, college roommate and my girlfriend's best friend. It rained the whole damn time except for the day we left. Cooking was hard. We were very dirty. It was the best camping experience I've had. Losing that area is a real shame.

 

Taken from a Facebook friend. My dad's house is at the base of the hills you see. Sounds like the southern parts of the SCU fires merged causing the plume. Fingers crossed the wind continues to push the fires in a south-eastern direction. We're also expecting dry lightning tonight or tomorrow. I'm just ready for this to be over. (And I'll pause for an appropriate phallic joke)

 

No worries. His house is under a warning, but he didn't wait. He's with my step-sister on the other end of town.

 

That's my safety-danger relationship with California in one photo. On one hand, I miss the golden hills in the summertime. But look at all that flammable material between the road and the first house's fenceline. The place has been going up in flames for tens of thousands of years. It's only recently since 40 million people decided to build a bunch of stuff where Mother Nature routinely clears space using fire as her primary option of choice.

We had shake shingle roofs in the 1970s and it's a wonder the whole neighborhood didn't burn to the ground at some point. One house fire and a strong wind could have wiped out half of Contra Costa County in six hours.

When Gwen and I drove down Highway 49 through the foothills two falls ago, I marveled at the scenery while in the back of my mind, thinking, "Man, this is a firestorm just waiting to happen."

And that's not to say what happened in Gatlinburg a few years ago couldn't happen here. This part of the Appalachians has a history of being maintained by natural wildfires. We've got a ton of dead leaves, branches and debris all over our property, and so does everyone else. And there's just one way in and out of the neighborhood, so if the fire comes from the west, we're hemmed in by the Chattahoochee. This summer's been extremely rainy, but I've chatted with the local fire chief and he's definitely alarmed by how a dry summer/fall could touch off an inferno around here.

 

Yep, it rained soot on my birthday party in Redlands one September, so I know of what you speak.

 

We still tell stories about how bad the smoke was from the Sonoma fires. Not good.

And that area of NorCal is under it again with the LNU becoming the second largest fire.