While everyone has been focused on the elections (and rightfully so) there have been some significant wildfires that are absolutely tearing through both Ventura County California and New Jersey. What has surprised me is how days later and as the tales of these fires come out no one is talking about them at all.
In California the "Mountain Fire" in Ventura County just north of LA started on election day, November 6th, and as of CaliFire's last report is only 17% contained. This fire absolutely exploded in size having burned over 20,500 acres. It has moved so fast that people are barely able to get out as soon as they are getting evacuation orders.
A Ventura County Sheriff’s deputy recounted a daring rescue during the fire, saving patients from a Camarillo Heights care facility. The deputy, along with other responders, evacuated the patients with only their clothes on their backs as their home burned to the ground.
The fire and smoke have even gotten to the point where helicopters had to be grounded for rescue. With winds between 50 and 60 mph, embers are being thrown over 2 and a half miles beyond the fire line creating a huge issue for firefighters. Over 10,000 people have been ordered to evacuate now and warnings have gone out to others to prepare to have to evacuate if they can't get this fire under control.
Thankfully there do not seem to be any reports of missing or dead people from this fire and hopefully, this does not change. Over 130 structures have been completely destroyed, most of them being houses, and 88 more have been damaged. With 2,420 personnel working to control the fire armed with 378 engines and 14 helicopters if the wind continues to subside like it was doing on Friday night firefighters have a chance to make substantial progress.
That isn't the only wildfire issue though as New Jersey currently has four sizeable blazes that they are battling. For now, these four blazes seem to be isolated and for the most part away from both people and structures. While one fire has been mostly contained it first burned 360 acres and there has since been another one that as of two hours ago has grown to 100 acres and is 0% contained.
These fires while not the size and scale of the California fires we have seen are going to be causing issues for residents in NYC for the next few days especially if the Cannonball 3 wildfire continues to not be contained in any way shape or manner. Images of the various fires are pretty wild as you can see
Hopefully, we can see these fires get contained without too much loss of property for those involved.
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Another aspect of this is that the rash of wildfires are causing insurance rates to skyrocket.
Some people blame climate change but I've also heard some people blame bad forest management, (i.e. not doing more controlled burns)
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Yeah prescribed burns are necessary for a healthy ecosystem as contrary as it sounds. Granted ya don't want a whole state or county going up in flames at once but smaller burns are critical
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I'm definitely surprised NJ wildfires aren't getting lots of coverage. California has lots of wildfires, so this one might not be considered particularly news worthy.
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Yeah NJ for sure threw me off because it's affecting NYC! Cali was more surprising just because 1) they haven't called that Congressional seat race yet and 2) the stories are freaking wild!
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Thank you for letting us know. I have heard nothing of these fires. I’m in NC.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @gmd 9 Nov
I thought there was a bunch of hype behind AI powered drones that are supposed to sniff out early fires and help sound the alarm and even fight the fires early.. hopefully that starts to pan out soon.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @anon 9 Nov
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If I am not there, what is there to say about it?
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Climate change is real and will affect everyone.
Those outside of cities more so, most likely.
Insurance companies have recognised this for many years.
Without insurance to secure mortgaged assets the fiat debt monetary system is in turn under threat of collapse.
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That's one way of looking at it.
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Denying climate change is more convenient for Libertarians. But is it honest?
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I don't know anything about libertarians. I can see that climate and weather is constantly changing. Are humans a factor? I would think so, We exist here. Maybe humans are a parasite on the earth. If humans are a problem, mother nature will take care of it. Not my concern. I focus on what Is in front of me. I am not a fire fighter on the coast. I am not a politician and don't support politicians. I have no way of knowing why those fires are happening. For all I know, they were started on purpose to get people arguing about "climate change". So from where I am sitting, there is not reason to talk about it. Unless you just want to spread fear. I guess that's a reason.
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The global scientific communities overwhelming consensus is that we should be afraid. That we need to take urgent and collective action to prevent devastating changes in the climate. Libertarians prefer to deny all the science and evidence than accept a situation where government might have an essential role in preserving a safe global environment.
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I don't care about libertarians or any political group. That's all noise. Let us Be the change. Live simply. Support local things. Grow your own food. Repurpose things. Support each other. These things are helpful. All politics and news stories are just to divide us and make us afraid. All fear ever does is create more fear. So I tune it out. And focus on how I can help my community be more substantial.
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