Mt. Wilson, California Fire Web CAM

[gnome]

http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~obs/towercam.htm

Not looking real good for our friends out left.

when you go to the link, it looks like a blank screen, that is the smokey sky. Scroll down to get an understanding of the problem.

[vetalalumni]

Yep, it is bad. We had a very small fire nearby on Sunday afternoon and fortunately it was put down within a few hours. Wildlife takes a big hit from these fires.

Once, a few years ago, I was the only one to show up at the office during a nearby firestorm. It was several miles away, but the smoke was thick. We officially re-opened two days later, and my native California colleagues chuckled at me for daring to venture out to work earlier.

[Ray1936]

The sun barely made it through the heavy smoky skies over Las Vegas the last two days. That's 250 miles from the fires. East wind came up today and cleared it out of here for now.

The fire so far has burned 156 square miles. That's equal to an area of Detroit and Dearborn combined. Scary.

[ccbatson]

Thanks environmentalists....still thinking it is a bad idea to sculpt the landscape to avoid tinder box situations like this?

[Ray1936]

Bats, I was looking at the Google Maps Street View of the Mt. Wilson and the transmission towers up there. The observatory has trees and shrubs right up to the damn building! For the life of me, I don't know what those in charge of the place were thinking. Brilliant people sure can be morons sometimes, eh?

[PCE]

http://www.inciweb.org is a good sight to monitor widfire activity. Here in Montana we have some pretty big burns. Something this Detroit boy wasn't accustomed to when I moved out here in 2003. That year we had 2 of the nations largest fires a few miles from my house. Huge mushroom clouds like a nuke blast. A roar liked I've never heard before. Unbelievable devestation. I feel for the folks in California right now.

[lilpup]

I find it rather surprising they don't do controlled burns or establish and maintain firebreaks in order to prevent these conflagrations.

[PCE]

It's quite the debate out here lilpup. I would think that managing our forests would be a better option but there is a portion of the population that believes we should let nature take it's course. I live within a 15 minute drive from over 500,000 acres that have burnt at various times since 2000.

[PCE]

Over half the mills here in Montana have closed in the last 25 years. Good paying jobs that fed a lot of families. Until the housing bust, most of the wood products came out of Canada. What are we doing to ourselves?

[barnesfoto]

I keep expecting the astroturfers and sick cultists to show up and protest the socialist ideology of universal fire protection, but I guess the big insurance companies are cutting back on their spending like everybody else..

[ccbatson]

Liberal environmentalists believe that mankind is destroying the planet if they intelligently design forested areas, especially in places where people actually live. They have won enough battles in this war to set up a Katrina/New Orleans style disaster [[by absence of design) waiting to happen.

[Ray1936]

I sent an email to the Mt. Wilson administrative staff inquiring as to why the trees and brush around the observatory are not cleared off in anticipation of fire. I'll post any reply I might get.

I'm not sure if it's academic thinking or California thinking. Prolly a little of both.

[ccbatson]

Way too little, and way too late.

[Stosh]

Way too little, and way too late.

Why? Is there a time limit?