Whittier Fire (7/13)

[John]

I'm a little concerned, and that got me checking online for info. What troubled me was seeing a pretty big flare up on the Southwest area, where a few hours earlier I'd seen the big DC-10 maneuvering. I presume it dropped a big load of PhosChek after I stopped watching, and may have done several loads flying out of Santa Maria. Anyway, we were out at SBA fiddling with the plane and just after sunset I saw the smoke plume much bigger than it had been half an hour earlier (see attached wide shot). Then as it got darker (about 8:25) I could make out flames that were intermittently visible through the smoke (other attached pic - area where we saw flames marked with oval).

Now maybe they're doing some back burning up the slope to make a bigger fire break in anticipation of the forecast "sundowner" winds tomorrow evening. But it seems to me unlikely they'd start such a big burn at nightfall just when most of the fire crews are coming off the mountain and only a couple of the night equipped helicopters can effectively fight any breakout burning. Also seems to me they'd not be starting any big burns this short a time before the forecast wind because it takes a while to put out all the embers so they don't blow across the containment area and start a new run.

I've found some stuff and will post it in a few minutes...

[John]

InciWeb reported at 9:42pm:

Total Personnel	1,101
Size	12,263 Acres
Percent of Perimeter Contained	52%

I've attached two screencaps of the 1:16pm (Central time) Ops Map 11MB PDF file in case you don't want to download the whole thing. One is zoomed slightly larger so you can barely read some of the place names. The other is the wider area showing the legend, more of the firebreaks, and how close the burn area now is to the Sherpa area.  I'll post again in a few minutes...

[John]

OK, I just caught local TV meteorologist Alan Rose on Channel 11 saying the scary flames aren't a danger according to fire officials. I was checking to see if broadcast TV is still working (it is), since they shut it down last time there were flames in that area. Looking at the remote cameras there (screencap attached - color in top row, "night vision" across the bottom), it sure looks like there's a big flare close by. Not only can you apparently see fire in the East & South views, but it's brightly lighting the South side of the ridge in the West view. Next I'll post screencaps of the latest IR satellites I can find...

[John]

OK, here are the latest IR satellite fire detections. The black and white one is almost certainly the most recent and the only one I'm sure of the time on (10:30pm). It's the lowest resolution and you can't easily tell the exact location, but it does show a pretty hot fire. The BLM one doesn't show any recent hi-res IR satellite heat detections, and though there are MODIS large red circles the times could be fairly old (hard to tell). The USWAWM one looks a bit different but like the BLM it's hard to tell the time(s) of the detections, and though the circles are smaller I think they're actually the same MODIS medium-resolution detections so fires they detected could be quite a bit off of the dot locations.

That's it for me tonight. Hopefully as Alan Rose said, this is all still well within the perimeter and there's no danger. Here's hoping we wake to clearing skies with little smoke tomorrow.

[sbsloth]

Thanks, John, great photos and info!  BTW, do you know what is meant by the sling sites on the Operations Maps?

[SB Citizen]

> Thanks, John, great photos and info!

I'm glad to be of any assistance, and appreciate knowing you found it
useful. Since I'm already seeking info on regional emergencies, I
started SBitZ.NET as a way to share what I find. My hope is that
everyone else with any info or news will also post their discoveries so
we all benefit.

Speaking of which, I see they're using the 154/Salvar helicopter
PhosChek loading station again. Hope they can get every one of the
hotspots completely out before any wind starts!

> do you know what is meant by the sling sites on the Operations Maps?

I haven't looked it up, but guessed that they might be related to water,
PhosChek, or hand crew supplies for helicopter pick up. If you find
out, please post or just reply to this email and Cc:
Santa Barbara CitiZen Network <sb...@googlegroups.com>

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