Guest Opinion by Kip Hansen
The NY Times is obsessed with the President — it cannot report anything without taking a pot shot at him.
In this case, NY Times Climate journalist, Kendra “Gloom is My Beat” Pierre-Louis, wades into the roiling waters of Climate Change and Politics, apparently far over her head.
The article in point is “Fact Check: Trump’s Misleading Claims About California’s Fire ‘Mismanagement’”, the NY Times’ response to a Presidential Tweet. Thanks to the brilliant investigative reporting of the Times’ staff writer, we get the lede as a subtitle: “On Twitter, the president claimed that the state’s wildfire woes are a result of poor forest management. The truth is more complicated.”
Who would have imagined that the complex problem of California wildfires could actually be “more complicated” than the President could communicate in 140 characters?
What did the President Tweet?
If we didn’t have the NY Times to tell us that it’s more complicated than that, we might have thought [if we were totally illiterate utter morons] that the problem was just Bad Forest Management and could be solved by denying California federal forest dollars. /sarc
It’s quite clear you see — the most careful nit-picking reveals that:
“This is misleading.
Mr. Trump is suggesting that forest management played a role, but California’s current wildfires aren’t forest fires.
“These fires aren’t even in forests,” said Max Moritz, a wildfire specialist at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Rather, the Camp and Woolsey fires, which are ripping through Northern and Southern California, began in areas known as the wildland-urban interface: places where communities are close to undeveloped areas, making it easier for fire to move from forests or grasslands into neighborhoods.” — NY Times’ Kendra Pierre-Louis
Technically, Kendra “Gloom is my Beat” tells us, it’s not a forest fire — it is a “wildland-urban interface” fire. We can see that this is not forest:
Pictured above: Paradise before the fire.
It’s the Burger King and the church both neatly tucked in amongst the pine trees that make it “not a forest”.
So when the pine trees burn like a blast furnace fed by 50 mph winds, whipped into a frenzied fire storm, it’s not a forest fire unless it’s in an official forest — the President was misleading us all by calling it a forest fire instead of … what? Maybe he should have said “wildfire” because it wasn’t actually in an official forest? How utterly inane.
By the way, it is simply false that the Camp Fire “began in areas known as the wildland-urban interface”. The Camp Fire, which destroyed Paradise, is known to have started near Pulga, which is east and a little north of Paradise, in the Plumas National Forest. So, the fire starts in a forest — a National Forest — and driven by high winds becomes a virtual fire storm that sweeps through the “wildland-urban interface” called Paradise.
“According to the [United States Department of Agriculture] report, 44 million houses, equivalent to one in every three houses in the country, are in the wildland-urban interface. The highest concentrations are in Florida, Texas and, yes, California.” — NY Times
To be perfectly clear, if fatuous, when lots of people (1 out of every 3) build houses in a forest, it is no longer a forest but becomes a “wildland-urban interface” by definition and therefore, the Times’ informs us, any subsequent fire there is not a forest fire.
“And the most “deadly and costly” fires happen at the wildland-urban interface, because they damage houses, towns and lives. The Camp Fire has already matched the deadliest fire in state history, killing at least 29 people, and the death toll may rise.
“We have vulnerable housing stock already out there on the landscape. These are structures that were often built to building codes from earlier decades and they’re not as fire resistant as they could be,” Dr. Moritz said. “This issue of where and how we built our homes has left us very exposed to home losses and fatalities like these.” — NY Times
Well, I’m glad that’s settled (and I hope the President has learned his lesson).
And what else did the President get wrong in 140 characters? Apparently, everything according to the Times.
“What Trump said: ” Billions of dollars are given each year, with so many lives lost, all because of gross mismanagement of the forests. “
The statement suggests that California’s forest-management problems are at fault. But the majority of California’s forests are federally held.
Of the state’s 33 million acres of forest, federal agencies, including the Forest Service and the Interior Department, own and manage 57 percent. Forty percent are owned by families, Native American tribes or companies, including industrial timber companies; just 3 percent are owned and managed by state and local agencies.” — NY Times
After insisting that the Camp Fire was not in a forest (and incorrectly claiming that the fire did not start in a forest — it did), the Times insists that because the federal government controls 57 percent of California’s forests it must be their — the Federal Government’s — fault. Not to put too fine a point on this, but if one is going to insist that it was not a forest fire and did not happen in a forest — how can the Federal Government’s majority control of the forests enter into the discussion?
That’s my fact-check of the NY Times’ failed fact-check.
My question? Has the NY Times editorial staff lost its collective mind altogether?
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I must admit I get weary of the NY Times’ absurd Editorial Narrative on the Environment and Climate Change — so many of their pieces on these topics are sophomoric and some are just plain silly — the above is a fine example of the “silly” category.
[Don’t they have real live Editors any more? — guys and gals with a lifetime of experience and a cigar or cigarette holder stuck in the side of their mouth — real life Perry Whites — who have seen it all and are tired of Cub Reporters making the paper look stupid?]
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This story does have a serious side — and bless her heart, Pierre-Louis actually reports on it in a different article co-authored by Jeremy White. This article is the real story behind the recent California Fires:
Americans Are Moving Closer to Nature, and Into Fire Zones
The fact is that one out of every three American homes are being built or already exist in “wildland-urban interface” or in the “wildland-urban intermixed” areas.
Here’s the definitions:
“The WUI [Wildland-Urban Interface] definition in the Federal Register was developed to identify communities at risk in the vicinity of public lands. According to this definition, “the Wildland-Urban Interface is the area where houses meet or intermingle with undeveloped wildland vegetation” (USDA and USDI 2001).
Areas where houses and wildland vegetation intermingle are referred to as intermix WUI.
Developed areas that abut wildland vegetation are characterized as interface WUI.
Although this definition was developed in conjunction with wildland fire policy, it does not explicitly account for differences in fire risk.
[reformatted for clarity — kh]
The Wildland-Urban Interface In The United States — RADELOFF et al. (2005)
The Camp Fire situation looks like this, in a series of images: (first one is a repeat)
The Camp Fire is believed to have started in Pulga — just east and north of the number 70 on the highway just outside of the red circle around Paradise. It is in the Pulmas National Forest, and indicated as WUI on the Silvis WUI map (second below).
Chico is a town – a city – it has houses and stores and a university. Paradise is both wildland-urban interface and wildland-urban intermix:
A close look at Paradise from the satellites:
Where we see gray and green intermixed we are looking at areas like these (repeating the picture far above):
The buildings (and the homes) are quaintly nestled into the landscape of coniferous forest — this is both intentional and foolish.
The result of this desire to get right into “Nature” is this:
Photo credit: Noah Berger/AP
And the Woolsey Fire in Malibu?
The Woolsey Fire started in the upper right hand corner, in the interface/intermix area shown (in the last image) in yellow and orange. Southern California’s infamous Santa Anna winds — the Diablo Wind, the Devil Wind — swept down from the northeast, blowing the fire south and west through the rugged chaparral-covered hills all the way to the sea at Malibu [whose point produces the famous surfing conditions there ].
Southern California chaparral “is characterized by nearly impenetrable, dense thickets (except the more open chaparral of the desert). These plants are highly flammable during the late summer and autumn months when conditions are characteristically hot and dry. They grow as woody shrubs with thick, leathery, and often small leaves, contain green leaves all year (are evergreen), and are typically drought resistant (with some exceptions). After the first rains following a fire, the landscape is dominated by small flowering herbaceous plants, known as fire followers, which die back with the summer dry period.” [source: Wiki] The chaparral is routinely destroyed — and restored — by infrequent fires (burning on average every 10-15 years).
[I grew up in Southern California — Los Angeles born and raised with university in Santa Barbara just north up the coast. I saw chaparral wildfires many times — manzanita brush can almost literally explode as the Santa Anna winds push fire through the hills and canyons — fleeing a chaparral fire in the hills is a terrifying experience that you will want to skip.]
We humans make lots of mistakes — one of them is building homes in among the trees and chaparral. We also build on crumbling sea cliffs, hurricane prone ocean fronts, in known flood plains and on sand bars/barrier islands — we build our homes in the darnedest and most dangerous places.
Fact-Check Wrap Up: The Times apparently feels compelled to denigrate the sitting President at every opportunity. He did use the language of the common man, calling these fires “forest fires” – quite correctly. In the case of the Camp Fire, they have been super-charged by decades of misguided forest management policies that have left many western forests with very high fuel loads — the result of policies that called for quick response suppression of every fire instead of letting the natural succession of fire and recovery take place. We are now paying the price. This mismanagement was almost universal and cannot properly be blamed on the Federal Government or State Government alone. State, County and municipal planners have created fire-risk nightmares all over the country by allowing homes to be built in areas that are at extremely high risk of fire. It is “more complicated” – – the situation will not be improved or corrected, nor could it possibly be, by denying California federal forest funds.
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Author’s Comment Policy:
We have seen these same types of problems with flooding, storm surge and hurricanes. Localities have failed to protect their citizens by forbidding the building of homes and businesses in know high-risk areas — and for many years failed to enact and enforce sensible building codes for the protection of buildings in risky locations. In my youth, homes all over California had beautiful redwood shake roofing — and redwood shake siding — which would dry to tinder in the hot dry California summers, igniting at the first few sparks from distant fires. They are now forbidden, but only after huge loses of homes. It is complicated and causes and results are chaotic in nature.
Where are the codes requiring sensible set-backs from highly flammable local vegetation? And codes specifying non-flammable siding and roofing? And codes requiring adequate cleared roadside verges that won’t turn fire escape routes into graveyards?
I am blessed by living in a modern Eden — the central Hudson Valley of New York State — where we have sensible, four-season weather with few extremes, [almost] no tornadoes, no hurricanes, and no fire storms. The area is heavily wooded but receives so much rain that forest fires, involving trees, are very rare — we do have occasional brush fires. The humidity makes for a bad allergy season though. And we had six to eight inches of beautiful light white snow last night.
I am discouraged by the lack of journalistic standards in general and appalled that the NY Times has reverted to old fashioned Yellow Journalism.
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The frequency of such massive fire events is obviously well documented for the most recent historical period, and I assume that the colonial archives in Seville will have information on the Spanish period. For a longer time scale something occurred to me watching an earlier post which showed the smoke and ash reaching the sea.
Given that many of these destructive events are driven by hot dry easterlies , propelling the ash towards the ocean , is it possible , by coring the off shore sea bottom to detect layers of ash , and of course date them by the C14 in the ash layer . Or do the tides simply remove all the evidence, unlike in the case of volcanic ash layers which are less soluble or less fine.
Those guys got forced out at the beginning of the paper’s hard $ times and were replaced by fresh college grad reporters for less than half of their total compensation packages, I’m sure. Those who’s incompetence propelled them to top positions at the NYT seem to feel editors can be replaced with spell-check
What comes to mind is “Great Caesar’s Ghost!”
Kip,
The inciweb site has an excellent map of the history (more than fifty years) of fires in the Chico-Paradise area:
https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/photos/CAPNF/2018-11-12-1221-Camp-Fire/related_files/2018_11_16-09.21.08.722-CST.pdf
G Franke ==> Great link == we see the Humboldt Fire that burned 70+ homes in 2008 in southern Paradise.
Just because a lot of forest land in CA is managed by the Feds, is not proof that this fire started in those lands.
In fact this fire did not start in federally managed lands.
What is it about liberal environmentalists and their inability to do even simple logic?
PS, until a few decades ago, federal wild land management procedures were as bad as CA’s. The consequences of that mismanagement are still being felt.
Mark ==> The fire is believed to have started near Pulga which is in the Plumas National Forest. When CalFire is done with the investigation, we will have information on the location more precisely.
Thanks Kip. Nicely done.
We live in the Wooo-e — about 3 miles from a defined forest.
Many years ago ( ~100) to about 40 years ago, cattle and sheep kept the plants reduced and the woody parts broken and crushed. This does not prevent fires but does reduce the severity. Enough houses have been built that the sheep are gone; some cattle and horse pasture remain. We have had big fast fires in the county and all are aware of the danger. “Firewise” and Fire-Adapted Community programs are encouraged.
We had several days of clearing and chipping on our place via a program funded by the State of Washington’s Dept. of Ecology and run through our County Conservation District. I’m still working on that issue. We need to do more. It takes time and money.
You mention types of siding. Ours is T1-11, from the early 1980s. It needs to be covered, but the good choices are expensive. Fiber cement composition { Class 1(A) fire/flame spread rating } is a good choice, pricey, and best done by pros. A previous owner had a large shed built just 6 feet from the house. Both should get new siding. $$$$
The reality is that making older existing homes safer is not happening rapidly, or not happening at all. New construction can be done better.
Despite what land managers do, or what the utility company does, this issue is not going away.
John ==> Yes — fire-proof roofing and siding must be mandatory for all new construction in fire-risk areas.
Refitting is always the big problem.
Thanks Kip, well done.
+10
Recall the Angora Fire near Meyers at S. Lake Tahoe in 2007, which destroyed 242 residences and 67 commercial structures. The Tahoe Regional planning Agency controlled and restricted homeowners’ ability to cut down trees and clear defensible space. Many trees that had been “approved” for removal were marked, but had not been removed when the fire started. The League to Save Lake Tahoe, the Wilderness Society and the Sierra Club’s influence on TRPA was singled out by homeowners in filing a class action lawsuit after the fire. Many residents also complained that the U.S. Forest Service had allowed about 165,000 acres of its land to become overgrown, further endangering adjacent homes, and fueling the property loss caused by the Angora Fire. “The house survived because we broke the law,” said Brent Abrams, 20. He and his mother cut down trees on Forest Service land near their house and replaced them with a grassy lawn, something the authorities likely would have never allowed. Many of their neighbors’ homes were destroyed, and only chimneys remain. “The federal government and TRPA didn’t create the fire, but it was because of their actions it was so extensive,” he said.
This is the biggest problem by far. Wood removal from these forests is down 80% since the 50’s. Good article here:
http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2018/11/looking-at-causes-of-recent-wildfires-and-resultant-property-damage-its-hard-to-point-the-finger-solely-or-even-mostly-at-co2.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CoyoteBlog+%28Coyote+Blog%29
Kip H:
Stop reading the New York Times!
If you’re reading it,
then you must be paying for it.
Why would anyone with sense,
which includes you,
support such a leftist-biased
newspaper?
If you have pet birds, however,
it makes a good bird cage liner.
Richard ==> The New York Times is one of the world’s “Newspapers of Record”.
If one wants to know what is happening and what is being said about what is happening, one has to read W I D E L Y.
If one just reads outlets that one already agrees with, one becomes stupider every day.
You evaded my comment
about PAYING
for a newspaper
that you criticize.
Mr. sneaky Hansen,
probably because you
DO PAY for the NY Times !
If you PAY FOR the New York
Times, then you ARE supporting
their strong leftist-bias (a bias
which you could find in hundreds
of other FREE websites / media sources).
Which makes you a hypocrite !
If you read the New York Times for FREE,
at a library, book store, or get yesterday’s
Times from a neighbor, then
you would NOT be supporting
a newspaper you criticize.
You last sentence:
“If one just reads outlets
that one already agrees with,
one becomes stupider every day.”,
… is an ignorant, wrong generalization,
and I can’t believe you wrote it.
It assumes one will automatically agree
with everything published by
a favorite media source.
It assumes people are not intelligent
enough to judge each article, or study,
INDEPENDENTLY.
It suggests that anyone at this website
ought to spend just as much time at
pro-global warming websites —
yes that is the ‘Hansen solution’
for “balance”.
Do YOU submit articles to websites that
believe in CAGW?
Do YOU spend much time reading articles
at websites that publish only pro-CAGW articles?
If you don’t, then why not?
Richard ==> I see you are back in high form today.
I pay for the NY Times because I read it — and would not find it convenient to get it second-hand. For years it was free on the internet, but the world has changed. Contrary to your opinion, reading news outlets with a differing political view than one’s own is not hypocritical — it is the only intellectually honest thing one can do.
You are absolutely right — I do think that the average citizen is not equipment, intellectually, educationally, or by temperament to read widely and judge each article or news item through a sharply focused set of critical thinking skills.
I do think that most people could be trained to do so if they had the desire and the patience and free time to dedicate to catching up on missed educational opportunities.
I do read pro-CAGW blogs and media, and hundreds of pro-AGW scientific papers every month.
Thank you for writing.
Hansen !
“Contrary to your opinion, reading news outlets with a differing political view than one’s own is not hypocritical — it is the only intellectually honest thing one can do.”
You “misread” what I wrote,
probably deliberately,
because you had no logical answer.
It is hypocritical to criticize the New York Times,
as you do,
while PAYING for a subscription,
as you do,
thereby supporting their business.
There are hundreds of other leftist-biased
media sources available for free — you’ll
get similar ”CO2 is evil’ articles and
summaries of (science fiction)
“climate studies”.
Anyone who criticizes the New York Times,
yet pays them for a subscription,
is a hypocrite.
And that would be you.
I typed slow this time, Hansen,
so even you could understand.
Well said. I read much that is half truth and have to delve deeper to get a truer understanding.
Everybody except NYT knows what is meant by ‘forest fire’. But that term is somewhat misleading. Look at photos taken after a ‘forest fire’. Often the trees still look good as new but the houses are gone. California is mostly three things, roughly categorized as forest, grassland, and buildings. They all burn, especially the near ground layer. Cliff Mass calls grass grassoline. It should not come as a surprise that buildings burn. Every major city has had its historical famous fire. Does anyone remember the Three Little Pigs?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Little_Pigs
Fires are natural to California. Maybe some more thought should be given to surviving and escaping them.
Just exactly like the BBC.
So (modern day**) childish and pathetic
** Modern day because Neanderthal kids wouldn’t have behaved like that – they were fed on breast milk while building their their brains in the 30 months post-partum.
Or, kids in 536AD for that matter. Or prior to (say) a century ago.
Maybe things were not just Quite As Bad as some peeps want to make out.
And here’s The Tangent:
It would seem that the ‘Sat Fat Cognoscenti’ no longer refer to Vegetable Oil as ‘Vegetable Oil’
The scientific and nutritionally correct term is now= Rancid Oil
Yup, I’ll go with that
Looking at the photos of the church and the McDonalds; I’m not seeing that they cleared the “Defensible space” around those buildings that might have protected them in the wildfires. I understand; people like to live near trees, and if you clear defensible space around buildings, you will eliminate the trees.
I read an article about a guy near Paradise who had, pretty much, done that. Cleared the brush, installed an above-ground pool for water storage, and had a big pump. And when the fire approached, he wet everything down and fought the fire, and saved his house.
I live in the Sacramento suburbs, and frankly it’s more urban than”sub”. But if I lived in the foothills, you can bet that there would be no brush and no dead or dying trees within 100 feet of my house.
Ken ==> Yes — clearing around the buildings — certainly removing the pines and their debris — is absolutely essential.
In my area, we have people doing exactly the same in woods full of yellow pine — luckily it is very humid here and we seldom see big fires.
As with others – excellent Kip.
I’d like to add, here’s a tweet from Pres Trump that our national mainstream media was not so quick to share with the public:
This is their standard practice – report on nothing that makes Trump look like who he actually is.
Gary ==> Thank you, hadn’t seen that Tweet. Appreciate it…
Wait, if the fire wasn’t in a federal forest as the Times claims:
THEN IT WASN’T THE FAULT OF THE FEDS! They can’t have it both ways.
If the land was California’s then it’s on their dime.
Who ever wrote this tripe should sue their journalist schools for malpractice since they obviously came out with a worthless degree.
Bear ==> It turns out that the Camp Fire DID start in the Plumas National Forest, up near Pulga. There is one image with the origin marked as a little red circle.
Smokey The Bear has told my entire generation at least that “ONLY YOU can prevent Forest Fires!” he says it in every national forest, park, and monument, even in the desert.
Yes, I saw that you pointed that out. It was the inconsistency of the writer that I was annoyed with.
The problem is that the writer claimed it wasn’t a forest fire (his statement not mine). If it wasn’t a forest fire it had nothing to do with whether the land was a private, state or federal forest. Therefore, it falls under California land management of the so called wildlands, so where is the Times condemnation of Jerry Brown and his government? They want to beat up on Trump for using the “wrong term” (forest) for what the bureaucrats call wildlands. It’s also typical bureaucratic wordplay. Let’s call it something other than a forest even though it a dense area of trees so it can’t be a forest fire.
Oh, and Smokey’s unintended consequence is the overgrowth of forests by preventing fires which took the forestry service a long time to figure out.
Bear ==> and you’ve got all that exactly right.
I was born in Los Angeles and have lived in SoCal my whole life. The area burns significantly every 10 years or so. I remember as a child when my family took a drive through the devastation wrought by the Bel Air fire of 1961 (the one last year was caused by a homeless encampment – LAPD is under orders not to disturb the homeless regardless of what they may be doing illegally, like open fires)
This was an excellent review but a few extra things. Deliberately poor management of our Forests, et al, is a feature, not a bug. The greens in this state have undue influence in Sacramento. They want anything that stifles or discourages human development. Too much of our forest land is sick – overcrowded with diseased and dying trees and undergrowth. Limited logging? Controlled burns? OHNOES!!!
An aside — fire resistant roofing and siding won’t make a lick of difference if flying embers are sucking into the attic space of a home via soffits. This is why you’ll see in many fires a kind of “hop-scotch” pattern of one house burned to the ground while the next one is barely scorched. Watch video of a house at the edge of these wildfires go up and you see it not catching fire ON the roof but flames first coming out of the attic area under the eaves.
Darleen ==> You make very good points. I’ll check out the soffit thingy.
I was born downtown LA in the old California Hospital, grew up in what is now Slauson Village — near W Slauson Ave and Van Ness Ave. Moved around 7 years old to Gardena, one block south of El Segundo, also at Van Ness Ave (my Dad wasn’t very inventive when looking for a new house, he drove down Van Ness looking for likely neighborhoods!) Went to George Washington High School on the western edge of Watts.
Darleen, thanks for bring this up again.
I’ve mentioned soffits several times in the past 3 years.
The screened openings often have 1/2 in mesh, I think.
One can simply tack a smaller mesh on the outside — a great architectural touch!
Or one can take the old ones out — often difficult — and put in new ones.
Don’t forget to clean the mounds of leaves from in front of the garage door where your $600 worth of “stuff” is, while your $40,000 auto is parked outside.
Clean out under your deck and replace firewood and other stuff with gravel.
Check with your local fire crew for more ideas.
Hi Kip,
I was born at St Vincent’s hospital. Grew up until my teens in Granada Hills (couple of fire scares there!) then went to high school in the OC (Sonora HS).
“Where are the codes requiring sensible set-backs from highly flammable local vegetation? And codes specifying non-flammable siding and roofing? ”
These were among the many things that changed after the devastating 2009 fires in Australia. There are working models out there if they care to look and can get over the not invented here syndrome, and of course the its all the climates fault syndrome.
Reminds me of the Marysville fire disaster in Victoria a few years ago. The local council made mandatory a WUI which added to the eventual deaths in the bushfire that ravaged the area, killing a total of 12.
As I recall, there was one individual who defied the requirement to surround his home with trees and instead cut them all down. He was fined $100,000 by the council. I also believe his was one of the few structures standing following the fire.
SMS ==> Australia, yes, I remember reading about that.
Set back from trees and brush are an important first defense from forest (or wild…) fires.
I remember a story from awhile back about a California community that was destroyed by a brushfire because they were not allowed to plow firebreaks due to some protected field mouse that lived in the area. Fire took out the homes but managed to barbecue the mice at the same time. Result: no mice protected and a whole neighborhood destroyed.
Marysville lost 34 people in 2009 and the total number lost during Black Saturday was 173.
What horrifies me is that the roadsides, the ‘escape’ routes, are now full of scrubby, shrubby growth of fire-prone natives again, all ready for the next time. My husband and I were commenting on just that, just this morning, as we drove to Marysville on the Maroondah Highway. We have been told, by local friends, that this highway was clear of such growth many years ago, with tall, clean-trunked trees. It’s been a fire-hazard ever since we first moved to the area, back in 1990.
We have built a fire-resistent house since moving back from the UK but I think that nothing survives a really bad firestorm. There are grassed areas around the house, deciduous trees and orchards, but also some conifers ( an Aleppo Pine and Deodar Cedar). However, we worry about the massive River Red Gums along the roadside but try to keep the grass verge under them well mown.
It isn’t in the nature of this life on Earth that we can ever be completely free of danger but we can try to do what is sensible and feasible to mitigate problems.
Time for a Conspiracy since the Military was testing Laser Weapons in an unknown town and from an unknown ship.
Forest Fires? That would mean you know a Forest was on fire! But no it was Cars that were on Fire and barely any trees caught fire. It looks to me like a Beam of energy swept through melted things.
I don’t think you have scene the actual pictures. Someone made a video of what was happening.
Fires wouldn’t ignore the trees and melt the cars in the street then burn down and melt buildings and the ground.
Eye ==> You forgot the /sarc tag.
Well, they successfully mired San Onofre power plant with regulations and red tape… that’s 2000+ MW of local capacity that has to be replaces with power brought in off the interconnects.
A summary of key points from https://www.redding.com/story/news/2018/11/11/trump-blames-state-fires-but-many-worst-federal-land/1971196002/ :
— A USA TODAY Network review shows many of the worst fires in California have burned largely on federal land.
— The largest blaze in state history, the 410,200-acre Ranch Fire, this past summer burned on large swaths of land managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management in Mendocino and nearby counties north of San Francisco.
— Six of California’s 16 most destructive wildfires in the past 25 years — in terms of structures destroyed — occurred on federal lands, according to Cal Fire records.
— In Shasta County, last summer’s 229,650-acre Carr Fire started on National Park Service lands before spreading to private property and eventually into the city of Redding.
— While the largest fires happened predominantly on federal lands, the majority of the most destructive fires burned across private land, destroying homes and businesses, according to state and federal records.
— It is not surprising that most of the large fires happen on federal land, considering that 60 percent of California land area is under some type of federal land management.
So, yes, President Trump was way off base in implying (most) blame on the State of California for forest mismanagement leading to wildfires. The US Federal government is likely the more culpable party.
I lived about 50 miles from Paradise for 30 years and visited a friend there often.
The two photos of businesses are in cleared area. There is a lot of very overgrown acreage in and around the town. Some vacant and some with homes.
I daresay even Nick Stokes would blush at the nitpickery on display in that piece.
Facts count
Lies kill
Lies dam lies
Federal land? ==> The Us National Park Service says the fire started on their land in the Plumas : “the Camp Fire in the north started along the edge of the Plumas National Forest within the State Response Area.”
https://www.fs.fed.us/news/releases/usda-forest-service-supports-california-fire-suppression-efforts
Kip,
According to the Cal Fire incident report at 8:00 p.m. on 11/8, the location is at the intersection of Pulga Road and Camp Creek Road.
http://cdfdata.fire.ca.gov/pub/cdf/images/incidentfile2277_4157.pdf A satellite image of that area suggests the area is a mix of shrubs/early forest succession and grass interspersed with mature trees. It looks to me like much of it has been clear-cut within the last decade; other areas look like they’ve been selectively logged or thinned. Patches of downed deadwood are here and there (typical after a forestry operation), along with a few bits of standing deadwood. At any rate, it’s clear this isn’t contiguous forest, and that it’s been heavily managed. Some might argue that ALL downed wood should have been burned, but the fact that it’s very patchy suggests it wasn’t a major factor in the spread of the fire, and having at least some dead wood is essential for the health of the ecosystem. (This is not an environmentalist perspective, but one of forest management.)
National Forests are often not entirely forest. This is due to natural mix of vegetation types as well as the fact that it is common for large areas to be clear cut and remain in a deforested state for years. Green on a map does not always reflect the mix of vegetation types.
The intersection the roads near the fire’s origin is in a wide power line corridor. Wikipedia states that firefighters were first dispatched to a “brush fire under Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) power lines near Poe Dam on the Feather River.”
Most of the area between the site of origin and Paradise is not forest. So it is unclear how better forest management would have protected the town.
The NYT article wasn’t entirely correct (the Camp Fire didn’t start at the urban-wildland interface), but neither is your “fact-check.”
To me this is an excellent example of the urban-wildland interface becoming an area of wildfire risk. As you point out, Paradise is spread out into forested areas. It is not clear to me that better forest management would have saved the town, but it’s possible that better planning and construction/retrofitting might have made a difference.
As you suggest, it is complex. Apart from the above, ignition source seems to be an ongoing issue. And while climate change is not necessarily a factor, it can’t be ruled out. (I’m aware of arguments and evidence on both sides.)
“In the case of the Camp Fire, they have been super-charged by decades of misguided forest management policies that have left many western forests with very high fuel loads — the result of policies that called for quick response suppression of every fire instead of letting the natural succession of fire and recovery take place.”
How exactly has this been the case in the Camp Fire?
In many areas these days, “let it burn” is simply not an option. There are so many towns, residences, campgrounds and trails scattered through forested/vegetated areas that to let wildfires burn could put lives and homes at risk. The solution is not so straightforward.
Then there are the immense areas of forest that have been killed by insects, build-up of dead wood is not simply the result of poor management or fire suppression. Drought, too, can lead to tree/shrub death directly or through susceptibility to disease and insects. Such problems are potentially influenced by climate change. It’s important to realize that even if one doesn’t believe this is the case so far, this is a good example of the possible future problems.
“Who would have imagined that the complex problem of California wildfires could actually be ‘more complicated’ than the President could communicate in 140 characters?”
It’s not a matter of space. Trump chose to blame California’s forest management as the SOLE cause of deadly wildfires. Who is really taking the “pot shots” here?
Kristi ==> It is the case for the camp fire as cknowledged by CalFire, The area between the orign and Paradise has not burned in recent yeears (see maps of hisotrical fires in California linked in comment), so when the winds kicked up to 40-50 mph, it turned the interceding forest (with its high fuel lod) inti a rel live Fire Storm that swept into Paradise,,,,
The Pine Beetle is not active in the Central Valley of California.
Fires in California are a natural result of the enironment and its climate — but they are little changed from a historic perspective,
The President didn’t make any statement s to exclusivity of cause.
My opinions are summarized in the Fact-check Wrap Up.
Kip,
” it turned the interceding forest (with its high fuel lod)”
WHAT INTERCEDING FOREST? Obviously you looked at the satellite photos, but I guess not close enough. Almost the only forest is a “buffer” zone around the Paradise! The entire area east of there until hwy 70 has been massively clear-cut. You can see the skid tracks. In large areas, the only trees left standing are dead. The Camp Fire was not a forest fire it got to the couple thousand feet around Paradise. You are just wrong! Look at it!
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Paradise,+CA+95969/@39.7971569,-121.4759509,224m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80832bd49578303f:0x50c92f9d6b33aa70!8m2!3d39.7596061!4d-121.6219177
You want to tell me that’s forest?
I wrote a manual for foresters for the MN DNR. I know a clear-cut when I see it.
“The President didn’t make any statement s to exclusivity of cause.”
WHAT?
“There is no reason for these massive, deadly and costly fires…except that management is so poor.”
Kristi ==> If you had ever been to California, and ever seen the actual environmental conditions there, had ever been there in the autumn after a dry hot summer, ever smelled the pine sap in the air almost thick enough by noon to start a barbecue, you would have some idea how this fire starts in Pulga and gets blown by high winds down to Paradise arriving as a full blown firestorm visible from space and soaring a thousand feet high.
Arguing from ignorance is NOT a strong position. You can not dispute things that have already happened. Didn’t you see the live footage of the fire as it approached Paradise? You don’t get flames that high and hot from a grass or brush fire.
Please….research that actually happened, not hypothetical “I think that looking at the satellite images there’s no enough stuff to burn”. Tell that to the firestorm victims.
Did you donate to the Relief Fund? Or do you just want to argue about how little the fire was because it “wasn’t a forest”?
Kip,
You asked if I lived in CA, not if I’d been there. I have. Several times. I know the conditions.
You chose to “fact-check” a story, and insulted the writer for, among other things, saying it wasn’t a forest fire. You belabored the point:
“The Camp Fire, which destroyed Paradise, is known to have started near Pulga, which is east and a little north of Paradise, in the Plumas National Forest. So, the fire starts in a forest — a National Forest …After insisting that the Camp Fire was not in a forest (and incorrectly claiming that the fire did not start in a forest — it did)… if one is going to insist that it was not a forest fire and did not happen in a forest…
“That’s my fact-check of the NY Times’ failed fact-check.
“My question? Has the NY Times editorial staff lost its collective mind altogether?”
I am simply saying that if you are going to fact-check someone else’s story, you should get your own facts right.
The fire most likely started under power lines in wide a right-of-way which is not forested. It traveled over land that was not forested. It reached the area around Paradise, which is forested.
You said that I said, “I think that looking at the satellite images there’s no enough stuff to burn”
That’s two mistakes you made in one comment!
You don’t think a hot fire can move through a clear-cut area? I even said that there were patches of downed dead wood, as well as standing dead wood, in the cleared areas. (I realize now that there could be more dead wood than I could see in areas that were beginning to regrow.) In mature coniferous forest there’s may be less flammable material at ground level than in an area that was cleared 5 or 10 years ago. Many post-Camp Fire photos show trees with an intact canopy.
“Studies show that removing trees, either for commercial logging or as a fire-prevention strategy, can actually make fires more intense, leading to further destruction for both humans and wildlife. For one, the debris that these cuts leave behind can set off massive fires, according to Char Miller, a professor of environmental analysis at Pomona College and an expert on wildfire policy.”
https://psmag.com/news/trump-pushing-to-clear-cut-californias-forests-to-manage-fires-thats-dangerous
The forest around Paradise hadn’t burned recently, as you pointed out. It could have had a lot of fuel on the ground. Perhaps even more important, there is more understory growth along forest edges, which would be the typical case in the urban-wildland interface. Then there’s dead and dry vegetation due to drought (there’s no reason at all to say this had nothing to do with climate change, as many have argued – but that’s another topic).
On the outskirts of Paradise you can see mixtures of scrub, intact forest and thinned forest, more like open woodland.
So was this a forest fire? As a whole, no. Some forest burned, yes, but it didn’t start in forest nor did it sweep through forest from there on its way to Paradise. To adamantly correct a story as you did, and insult the writer while you’re at it, you should get your facts straight. That’s all I’m saying. There’s nothing hypothetical about it.
Kristi ==> Well, one things for sure, you never give up — seldom right, but you don’t give up.
The fire started in the Plumas National Forest. I can’t change the facts — and any fussing about “forest” fire and “some other kind of new-aged, current lingo, name” for a fire of this Nature is just silly nit-picking about a horrendous disaster — which was the point of that part of the essay. (I hate it when I give in and actually tell you what the essay was about — I keep hoping you will figure it out for yourself — nearly everyone else gets it on the first reading.)
Kip,
You don’t get it. The fact that it started in a national forest is irrelevant – that doesn’t mean it started in forest. YOU are the one that insisted the NYT writer was wrong. She wasn’t.
The latest Camp Fire update from Juan Brown – very informative.
Why do people think a warmer climate is drier? It isn’t. Warmer climate periods are wetter. It is cool climate periods that are dry and result in desert expansion. I think it probably has to do with people’s thoughts that “deserts are hot, so warmer temperatures must make more deserts” but the opposite is true.
crosspatch,
As I understand it, the effects are regional. It probably depends, too, on the relative terms “warmer,” “cooler,” “drier” and “wetter.” We are not talking glacial and interglacial periods here – but maybe you weren’t either.
Apart from that, temperature has a marked effect on microclimates. Warmer temperatures mean greater plant transpiration rates and more soil moisture loss. Even with no change in precipitation, this can have an effect on plant moisture content status.
…I just ran across this interesting page.
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/drought/201505#det-reg-spei
I happened to be looking at 2015. “In California, May 2015 and December and the summer months of 2014 were wetter than normal across much of the state, but the last 12 months still ranked as the 29th driest June-May in the 1895-2015 record, statewide, in spite of those wet months. Ten of the last 15 years (June-May periods) have been much drier than normal in the state. The persistent record warmth of the last three years has combined with the extreme dryness to produce a record dry 36-month SPEI for California.”
SPEI is the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index, which takes into account both temps and precip. Those three years were worse than any 3 years of the 1930s (for CA)! Such sustained low-moisture conditions can have a lasting effect on vegetation health, even if they are followed by normal weather.
From the latest summary:
“On a broad scale, the 1980s and 1990s were characterized by unusual wetness with short periods of extensive droughts, the 1930s and 1950s were characterized by prolonged periods of extensive droughts with little wetness, and the first two decades of the 2000s saw extensive drought and extensive wetness (moderate to extreme drought graphic, severe to extreme drought graphic).”
This page explains different drought indices. Interesting maps.
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/drought/201810
We had 200 years of drought in California about 1000 years ago. Fallen Leaf lake just south of Lake Tahoe was hundreds of feet below its current level. It was that low for so long that the area around the shoreline became forested. That forest still stands today far under the surface of the lake. The past 500 years are estimated to likely be the wettest period in the past 10,000 years. What we consider “normal” is likely wetter than most of the time in any given 120,000 year glacial cycle. These dry periods are not unusual for the species that live here. The problem is that humans have lived here only a very short period of time and have not experienced the extremes nature dishes out a multi-century scale.
https://www.hcn.org/issues/44.22/underwater-forest-reveals-the-story-of-a-historic-megadrought
crosspatch,
No argument from me! But climate changes because things cause it to change.
This video starts out blaming environmentalists for restricting management, as many others tend to do. It makes me wonder just how much this is actually due to environmentalism, though. I can’t see where greenies could be blamed for objecting to clear cutting, but do they also object to controlled burns, for example? Do all green groups actually advocate a completely hands-off approach to forest management everywhere? Somehow I doubt it, but I could be wrong. Anybody know?
This is one take on the environmentalist perspective, with comments from a couple environmental lawyers.
https://www.outsideonline.com/2335416/zinkes-hot-take-fires-conspiracy-theory
One interesting claim is that the brush that regrows after clear-cutting is actually more flammable than intact late-successional forest. This make a lot of sense to me, since closed-canopy forest has much less growth at ground level to burn; it takes a much hotter fire to make it into the canopy. If true, it might help explain why the Camp Fire spread so quickly, since (as I pointed out in my post below) there is evidence that much of the area around the point of origin was clear-cut.
I think much of the problem is simply one of economics. There is too much forest out there to manage with available funds and staff.
Sorry, but no. Because of EAJA, the American taxpayer provides essentially limitless funding for whacko green groups to shut down logging on forests “managed” by the federal government. That’s right, WE pay for them to sue US.
And, there would be PLENTY of money for better management, if logging was returned to federal forests.
I live in Lincoln County, Montana, a county unlucky enough to be dominated by the Kootenai National Forest (KNF), fully 78% of the land area. Time was, there was a large sawmill complex in Libby, employing thousands. Today, despite annual net growth of more than 500 million board feet (mbf), the KNF struggles to move 50 mbf, and there isn’t an operating sawmill in the entire county. We are surrounded by BILLIONS of dollars of standing timber, and we boast the highest unemployment rate in all of Montana, with all the social ills attending thereto. Instead of exporting 2×4’s, Lincoln County exports its children. And, the KNF with each passing year grows older, more densely stocked, more decadent, more susceptible to insects and disease, and more fire prone. Lincoln County is not alone – this story is repeated over, and over, and over again across the US West.
This is immoral, and wrong.
LKMiller,
It’s economics. The Chinese market for lumber has dropped precipitously. Canada produces a lot. Environmentalists don’t waste time with most NF unless there’s wilderness area, old growth or rare and endangered species. There is PLENTY of clear-cutting going on, (just look at the area around Paradise) but it’s a tough market. I worked for the MN DNR forestry division.
And, you conveniently ignored the point I made about EAJA. Sorry, but when you can address the point I made, which is absolutely true, c’mon back.
BTW, I also worked for MN DNR, a number of years ago.
LKMiller,
Sorry. I didn’t even know what EAJA was, so kind of skipped over it. Didn’t realize it was your main point.
But attorney’s fees are only awarded if it is found that the government’s position is not “substantially justified.” Not sure how that translates to reality, or how often it happens. Seems like that’s not uncommon, though, in civil proceedings.
Interesting you worked for MN DNR!
Kristi,
That you don’t know what EAJA is and does is disturbing. Passed in 1980 during the last year of the Carter regime, EAJA (Equal Access to Justice Act) has had the unintended consequence of forcing the US taxpayer to fund the frivolous lawsuit party that has shut down the National Forests. The spotted owl hoax and 1994 Northwest Forest “Plan” are other drivers, as are the myriad of often conflicting laws passed by an ignorant Congress in the name of “saving” the environment.
I have the data, and there is nearly an inverse relationship between acres burned and volume harvested on the National Forests, accelerating after the NFP in 1994.
And, my other point of the economic and social wreckage left in the wake of federal land mismanagement remains valid. Surrounded by billions of dollars of standing timber, that the people must suffer maximum unemployment is immoral, and wrong.
LKMiller,
I don’t know what you’re talking about. There is clear evidence of extensive logging in KNF. For example,
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Kootenai+National+Forest/@48.6946002,-115.4333818,5757m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x5366a712797cbd81:0xc49a25ee347f480c!8m2!3d48.6843758!4d-115.6152448
The national forests are not “shut down” by any means.
Sorry about the economic hardships, but it’s not just legislation that controls the timber industry, it’s supply and demand, including international trade.
Once again, the gov’t only pays if the lawsuit is successful. I bet that dampens the number of “frivolous” lawsuits – suing the gov’t is a spendy proposition.
Kristi ==> I take it that you do NOT live in California?
Kip,
No, I don’t. What’s your point?
Kristi ==> Same reply as elsewhere. You should understand first what people are saying, then comment on that.
“It makes me wonder just how much this is actually due to environmentalism, though.”
You might want to research who opposed and lobbied against a proposal Gov. Brown made to the Assembly near the end of the last session. So-called “environmental” groups were lined up in opposition to simply allowing a modest increase in the size of trees that can be thinned from 30 inches to 36 inches. These people are quite insane. They sit in their San Francisco apartments shoveling their trust fund money into orgs that are burning people alive due to their policy positions. It is my personal opinion that many of these “environmental groups” should be sued out of existence.
crosspatch,
Size of what? Diameter at breast height? That’s the standard way of measuring trees – and 6 inches is not insubstantial. Can’t be that, though. Circumference? It’s a 20% increase, at any rate. And a big tree, hardly what I’d call thinning, though I suppose if you’re talking sequoias…
How would it cause people to burn alive?
There have to be environmental groups. It’s checks and balances. Otherwise industry would do whatever they wanted, and that wouldn’t be any better for fire control.
The Blancolirio Channel is very truthful.
I haven’t read all the comments, so this may be redundant.
Author: There’s a missing “not” in: “Localities have failed to protect their citizens by forbidding the building of homes and businesses in know high-risk areas ”
I read or inferred on another thread that state regulations on private land might make brush clearing, etc., something that is restricted or requires a permit.