Tag Archives: Fire

Out of the Pan Into the Fire…Sylmar Firestorms

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR PINK SATURDAY!

Sheesh! I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings but Southern California is experiencing yet another State of Emergency with a fire in Sylmar. This photo is not from the Sylmar fire but just a visual to give you an idea of the type of area they are dealing with today. Right now every freeway in the North San Fernando Area is shut down so the fire department can have easy access to the fires. The fire jumped the I-5 fwy and the 210 freeway.  So Interstate 5, 405, Highway 14, the 210 fwy, are all shut down in the North San Fernando Valley. The 118 fwy in the San Fernando area is shut down, too. The only north/south freeway that is open right now is the 101 fwy. The 101 fwy runs along the coast and then heads southeast through the southern part of the San Fernando Valley, through Hollywood, into East L.A.

 

We were going to be driving south today to a birthday party in Whittier but we are now staying put even though the freeway closest to us is the 101, the open freeway. We figure everyone else who tries to go south or north today will try to get to our freeway and what a nightmare it might be trying to travel. We in the Southern California area are also being asked to really conserve electricity because two major electricity converters/transformers were damaged in this fire and they are concerned about electricity suppy. We are expecting the temperatures today, because of our Santana wind conditions, to be in the 90’s! We are hoping that the winds die down soon so firefighters can get a handle on this devastating fire. One whole mobile home park has been totally destroyed (600 mobile homes). We’re praying for the comfort of everyone who suffers loss and for the fire fighters to have extraordinary strength to keep fighting…

Yikes! Now there is a fire in Yorba Linda and people are evacuating to Esperanza High School. The School where my niece teaches…

Anaheim Hills is now sitting on pins and needles. My BIL and his wife live there. They have a reservoir behind their home and I just got off the phone with them listening to the helicopters overhead gathering whatever water they can from that very low reservoir. They are not in danger unless the fire jumps the 91 fwy. Boy oh boy, things are scary for a lot of people in Southern California right now…

Whoa! Now the evacuations in Brea are getting close to my parents. They haven’t been told to evacuate yet but the evacuation area is about 2 miles from their senior apartments. They are getting their documents together and leaving to go to my sisters house in Whittier.

Photos from my niece Annie driving home to Anaheim Hills and then a photo of the helicopters coming to the reservoir behind their home retrieving water…

 

The 91 fwy. at Imperial in Anaheim Hills/Yorba Linda

 

The reservoir behind their home in Anaheim Hills…

The Corona Fire which jumped to the Yorba Linda Fire and then jumped to the Anaheim Hills Fire and moved on to the Brea and Chino Hills Fire is now threatening parts of Diamond Bar. The 57 freeway remains closed. The Sylmar fire is looking good. The winds seem to be cooperating better today although there are still gusts.

As far as the Tea Fire goes here is an update from this morning.

By and large, last night was quiet and today, the fourth day of the Tea Fire, should see further recovery efforts by firefighters. So far, 1,940 acres have burned and 210 homes have been lost — 130 in the City of Santa Barbara and 80 in the County of Santa Barbara. Damage assessment is continuing.

Photobucket is holding all my photos from 2007-2015 hostage and demanding a ransom for me to access them. I’m slowly cleaning up many of my posts where PB have added ugly black and grey boxes where my photos used to be. So frustrating!

Santana Winds and Dry Brush

On Saturday morning Dear and I took a hike up from Sycamore Canyon in the Santa Monica Mountains to a Scenic area overlooking the Pacific Ocean near Pt. Mugu. We were struck with how dry the brush was and Dear commented on how easy it would be for a fire to spread through this type of brush. This is a collage I made of some of the dryness we hiked through. We are now having a Santana Wind event in Southern California and there is a large fire burning in the Angeles Forest East of Los Angeles. I’m sure the terrain there looks a lot  like this, too.

What are the Santana or Santa Ana Winds?

The Santana Winds or Santa Ana Winds, most common in the late summer and early fall, begin with dry air moving in from the interior of the U.S. towards Southern California. As this air flows down into the Los Angeles-Orange County Basin through the low gaps in the mountains (notably Cajon Pass on the east end of the San Gabriel Mountains and Soledad Pass south of Palmdale), it compresses and warms about five degrees Fahrenheit for every 1,000 feet that it descends. Though these winds are much cooler high in the mountains, they can become hot and dry and assume gale force when descending into the Los Angeles-Orange County Basin. They are often the source of air turbulence for aircraft approaching Los Angeles International Airport.

The original spelling of the of name of the winds is unclear, not to mention the origin. Although the winds have been commonly called Santa Ana Winds or Santa Anas, many argue that the original name is Santana Winds or Santanas. Both versions of the name have been used. The name Santana Winds is said to be traced to Spanish California when the winds were called Devil Winds due to their heat.  The reference book Los Angeles A to Z (by Leonard & Dale Pitt), credits the Santa Ana Canyon in Orange County as the origin of the name Santa Ana Winds, thereby arguing for the term Santa Anas.  This might be supported by early accounts which attributed the Santa Ana riverbed running through the canyon as the source of the winds. Another account placed the origin of Santa Ana Winds with an Associated Press correspondent stationed in Santa Ana who mistakenly began using Santa Ana Winds instead of Santana Winds in a 1901 dispatch.

Special credit for the research assistance of Librarian Nancy Smith of the Metropolitan Cooperative Library System Reference Center, Los Angeles Public Library.

I hope this is helpful information when you hear news about Santana winds in Southern California helping to spark fires.

After our hike through all this dryness we were rewarded with these glorious views of the Pacific Ocean…

 

We were blessed with a few cool days and now with the Santana Winds blowing in we’ll be seeing the temperature rise again this week.

Wherever you are and whatever your weather have a wonderful week.

Tremble before him, all the earth! The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved. Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad; let them say among the nations, “The Lord reigns! Let the sea resound, and all that is in it; let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them! Then the trees of the forest will sing, they will sing for joy before the Lord for he comes to judge the earth. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good; his love endures forever. ~ 1 Chronicles 16:30-34

Photobucket is holding my photos hostage from 2007-2015 and replacing them with an ugly black and grey squares demanding money to release them, so frustrating.