Well i ventured back to HC for two posts . . .

[Phil513]

Yes, they are pretty ferocious out here at times. This one burning now jumped an 8 lane concrete freeway.

One last year did too, across the I-15. Regular fire breaks dont even help.

 

[Mark Wein]

One thing that I have noticed is that whenever we have fires here in California people do act like we are being Pansies about the whole thing...last time we had the big fires I remember some comments like this guy and I don't understand why...

I really don't get it either. There have been times when we've had forest fires here where the smoke gets pretty thick. It's not so thick that you can't see, and if you're healthy, it doesn't choke you to walk outside, but it's thick enough to bother your eyes and the smell is pretty overpowering.

We don't have the same kind of fires here that you have there though. Our forest fires generally burn in a line around the perimeter of a mountain, starting at the bottom and working their way up. The flames very rarely get over a few feet tall, though the fire line may be several miles long at a time, and the fire may eventually burn up thousands of acres of forest.

But those big wildfires you guys have in CA are just a completely different animal.

I am not sure why but in recent years the fires seem to have gotten worse. Possibly we are overbuilding houses (not anymore this year, though )in outlying areas and watching them burn is getting our attention more....

This time of year the winds wake the moisture out of the brush and add oxygen to an existing fire..I think the winds themselves will turn anything into fuel for the fire....