Straight Outta Mordor: Notes from the LA Fires
(Photo: Dave Bullock, more here, click image to enlarge). Yes, they come every year, but the 2009 fires are now being reported as the largest ever in LA County's history. 122,000 acres and counting (the land mass of San Francisco and Las Vegas combined, with room to spare). Watching the blaze from a seaside rooftop last night was like gazing out at a distant, roiling Mordor.
Two firefighters died. Today, a quick Twitter scan reveals ambient "air-fear," worries over E.T's house, gay porn stars vowing to soldier on while studios scorch; confusion between snow and ash; citizens afraid their cars have developed dandruff overnight, and cigarette smoking as training. The web yields many a moody video of "pyrocumulus" and slow-moving doomclouds, and abundant photosets.
The hundred-year-old Mt. Wilson observatory is a site of huge importance in astronomy history. It's seen its share of blazes. And last night, it was as if the observatory webcam had suddenly plopped down on the surface of the Sun. Communications towers nearby carry signals for every major TV channel in LA, as well as a number of radio frequencies. The site is still at risk.
Some of what I'm following: On Twitter, hashtag #stationfires. @LATimesfires is doing a nice job. And Load this KML in Google Earth for a comprehensive data set. Please share other resources of note in the comments.
Todd "Telstar Logistics" Lappin is wowed by the giant planes we're using to fight the fires. Snip:
Things are slowing down today, as temps ease and humidity rises. The fire chief just downgraded the Station Fire status from "angry" to "cranky." But containment is still only at 5%, and officials say the fires won't be fully controlled for two more weeks. For now, my advice for fellow LA residents? Don't inhale.Aviation history was made today as a Boeing 747 Supertanker made its debut drop on a live wildfire.
Tanker 979 is a specially modified Evergreen 747 configured to carry 20,500 gallons of retardant, enabling it to lay down a fire line as much as three miles long from an altitude of 300 to 600 feet.
the latest
latest episodes
OK: foam generators that produce a fifty foot high bubble?
What is that wonderful music Dan B. put on his timelapse video?
BTW I spent yesterday and the day before driving south from Yellowstone to L.A. through Utah. They've got about a dozen fires burning there but none as newsworthy (because none near high-density population centers) as the Station fire. Still, it was surely a scary and spectacular drive, especially as we passed freeway exits serving small communities - exits which had been closed and were guarded by blinky-lighted UHP patrol cars as a gigantic pall of smoke rose in the middle distance.
Almost to beautiful to be a disaster...
Live in Burbank. The photos are beautiful but it's not at all pretty here - forecast 103 and ashy. Staying inside with AC on.
more a question than a curse
how could hell be any worse,
the flames are stunnin,
the camera's runnin
so take warnin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJjAVOxA63Q
Wow, I'm really impressed by that converted 747. It looks unweildy and is flying through the turbulence and smoke that a fire generates, at 300 feet, while dealing with the weight changes and turbulence of dumping liquid.
I know nothing about flying, but that doesn't sound like an easy day at work. That pilot must have (metaphorical and gender-neutral) balls of steel.
Hrm. It is weird to use San Francisco in a comparison for land sizes because it is quite small. San Francisco is only about 30,000 acres (about 46.7 sq. miles or 121 km^2).
@#4, I'm at the beach today and it's the hottest day we've had here all year. ridiculous.
I've been squirrelling away California wildfire pics for some time now. I've some amazing shots of (I think) the Corral fire from a couple of years ago, views across (I think) the coast north of L.A., found on (I think) Flickr; hmmm and neither google nor flickr's own search is turning them up, oddly. They might well have been linked from here...
I've also got hooked on the mostly-silent raw video feeds from news helicopters. They come and go, and/or are followed by god-awful talking head barbie-and-kens, I've wasted a lot of time compulsively searching and monitoring... when they turn up they're, IMO, _amazing_. 18h ago I fell asleep with http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=2n flickering away at the foot of the bed (sadly it's not working now.) Searching for "live TV stream news California L.A." turns up a lot.
Time to repost the wonderful/poignant Deathcab for Cutie video for Grapevine Fires. Just don't watch it if you are actually there.
That music is "The Big Ship" by Brian Eno from his album "Another Green World."
Hoorah! http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=2n is working again (for me, here in the UK, YMMV etc.)
I've been a broadcast news addict since the age of 12, but for ongoing disasters - fires, hurricanes, market crashes - it seems like following live data online has replaced broadcast. (Yeah, statement of the bleedin obvious, I know, but...) e.g. for hurricanes, I anchor myself firmly to the Jeff Masters / Wunderground blog, which carries masses of live data (radar, tide gauges, pressure, multiple remote sensing - visual, infrared etc.) For the credit / banking crisis, poke around and there's a ton of live or nearly-live data sources. And so on.
I've been involved in some disaster recovery / business continuity planning at work, and it's mad me increasingly curious (and increasingly apprehensive) about one particular disaster that's been touted and predicted for decades, namely the Big One.
Dear humankind: it's time to move out of the forests and hills and polders and tornado and hurricane-prone lands.
Arcologies anyone?
Straight outta Mordor / crazy BoingBoinger named Xeni. / You want 'pocalypse vids / she got plenny.
Apologies to all.
The best ever version of Straight Outta Compton. Obviously NSFW.
The real deal is worth a re-watch.
I wonder if we'll get any awesome photos from orbit this time.
I remember the last really major fire near LA and the awesome NASA photos of the gigantic smoke plume from it.
Oh yeah, this is what it's all about: chopper video PLUS CHAT from random yahoos trolls wingnuts, fruitloops and k1dd135.
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/CBS-News
#disasterporn++
KTLA is also good: http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-tivid-livestream-b,0,1174195.tividlivestream
...but I'm all outta bandwidth :(
Will watch that with sound later, Antinous, thanks!
Airpillo: MODIS is your friend... remote sensing fom orbit:
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?project=aeronet&subset=La_Jolla.2009243.terra.250m
et cetera
maybe someone should turn on the rain, duh! (hope this helps!)
@IMIPAK...I was going to thank you for the link but I just spent fifteen minutes of my life that I will never get back watching a tree burn live in SoCal...Too...much...information...must...try to...turn..off..computer!
Is this because of global warming? It is, isn't it. :(
Weird, I just read my own tweet linked on BoingBoing. My work here is done, I'd say. Thanks, Xeni!
Xeni: The link for observatory webcam is all borked up like. I think I've got it correct here.
well, it's gratifying to see some money and tech spent for things like this (the 747). How much better the world would be if priorities were correct.
A few years ago we had a fire near our house in Montana (Black Cat Fire. Look it up). When we got back to our house, the hills behind us were still somewhat on fire, but not spreading. At night, it also totally looked like some mordor shots from LoTR. It wasn't bright (like in the shots above), since the fire was basically out. It just looked like a whole bunch of camp-fires of the mordor army :)
Fire at night (which is when we had to evacuate) is actually intensely beautiful. It was travelling across grassland, and so had made a 'front' that was moving toward our area. Truly wonderful to behold.
If only it didn't also destroy and kill, I could enjoy it much more...
In other news: people who live on a flood plain are being flooded out again this year.
Los Angeles fires, 2 firefighters die. Gets reported immediately on BoingBoing.
Victorian (Australian) Bushfires 173 people die, half the start is on fire, fires continue to burn for a full month and the smoke is even visable in New Zealand. Never once reported on BoingBoing.
I'm not complaining that the LA fires are being reported, but it did disappoint me that no Boinger took any time to even write a single post about the horrible tragedy that took place in February.
Itsumishi, in this case, I'm reporting about something within 10 miles of my home. I'm here, I'm local, I'm affected, so I'm thinking about it.
You are not watching CNN. You're not at nytimes.com. Boing Boing is still primarily the personal blog of a number of people who post about things that affect them personally.
We often post about things happening elsewhere in the world, but we did not in that case. We're not a news organization. It's not the same thing.
the world is drenched in tragedy every waking moment. The specific arouses the general sentiment, to actually see all is to die.
Talk about the brutal irony and duality of nature: the L.A. fires always produce spectacular sunsets http://www.twitpic.com/g5yd9.
@Antinous / Xeni, #15/16:
Sir / Madam, I fear you are mistaken.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72uJVMP5I38
@wolfiesma #23: very hard to attribute one event to changes in the climate, but it's accurate to say that many GCMs (models) predict long term drought in the American SW. See, e.g., http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/070405-us-drought.html
very hard to attribute one event to changes in the climate, but it's accurate to say that many GCMs (models) predict long term drought in the American SW.
Many, many groundwater wells agree with the models, and most clouds seem to have been in agreement for some time, reservoirs are on strike in solidarity with the proposed changes to the scientific if models.
* ...to the scientific models
High time to cut waaaay back on water usage. It is getting extreme. I think we may be heading for a lawn watering intervention/confrontation when I go back to see the folks in Cali. You'd think they'd see the fire on Mt. Wilson from their front steps and make the connection. But no, they don't.