Southern California Fires

While these fires are, for now anyway, behind us, many of you know that these fires came perilously close to my (Jeff's) place of work Spectrolab, in Sylmar. What we had not known was that a security guard swept the building on the morning of the fires to insure that everyone got out and he took some pictures of the fires as he went. These pictures were taken between 5:30 a.m. and about 5:45 a.m. on the morning of October 16, 2008. The first picture (looking SE) below shows the wall of flames approaching Spectrolab about 5:30 a.m. on October 16th.

The next four shots are taken just a few minutes apart, and show how intense a fire fanned by 40 to 60 mph winds can be.

Then, the fire burns down to just behind the fenceline (note the burning embers being propelled by the winds)

Then, the entire hillside due east is ablaze. This picture was taken from my office window! The fire moved so fast, neither the early arriving employees or the UPS lot directly behind the fence had a chance to fully vacate all their vehicles. Fortunately the fire moved so fast that they were spared further damage.

And 15 minutes later it moves on to burn something else. No serious damage is done here anyway.

What I learned is that when fire comes knocking, get out. I have abandoned my heretofore held belief that I'd stand my ground with a garden hose, sprinklers and a shovel. No more. Better yet is call Uncle Bob and get more fire insurance coverage.