Weekend Update: The Fires This Time

The fires here in California, Oregon and elsewhere in the West have finally captured international attention, as well as their dire relationship to the future of the climate crisis.  I'll have more to say about that anon.

In the meantime, there's a pretty good summary in the Guardian, particularly on how the fires are destroying towns and encroaching on cities.  David Wallace Wells at New York describes the past week, especially in California, and suggests the specific forest issues pose a daunting future, to say the least.

These articles reveal relevant forest practices and population movements into fire-prone areas because of prohibitive costs of living in and around cities, but they also describe the stunning new qualities and ferocity of these fires, including the "firenadoes" and resulting massive smoke plumes.

Here in Arcata on Saturday it was a gloomy day pervaded by fog, seemingly a normal day if it were winter.  However the fog disguised the smoke, and the air quality was deemed the worst it has been so far.

The fire closest to us has slowed, and hasn't yet made it into Humboldt County itself, but remains well to the south.

 Some clearing of the air is expected to start tomorrow or Monday, and be well underway by Tuesday.  We might even see some cleansing rain Tuesday or Wednesday. By then attention should swivel away to hurricanes on the Atlantic Coast.  But that doesn't mean the fires will go away here.  There's word that some Oregon fires may burn into the winter. The short term forecast for the fire areas is also for cooler temperatures and maybe some moisture next week.

 In the beforetimes, our rainy season began in late October or November.  This year who knows?  It may not come at all.  Or--I keep getting the perhaps wishful feeling--it may come early, and give us some wet months.  In the meantime, it's another reason to stay inside.

Terrorism in Progress

So far most commentary and outrage has focused on what Trump said and did--or didn't say and didn't do--in February when he told Bob Woodward that he knew how dangerous the covid virus is.

But in view of what he admitted he knows in February, what about focusing on what he is saying and doing--and not saying and not doing--right now.  Because the virus hasn't changed, and his knowledge of it hasn't changed.

He told Woodward it is highly transmissable, through the air, and very deadly, affecting young and old.  That's what it was in February, and that's what it is now.  (By the way, look at the date on this New Yorker cover.)

What I want to see is video of his rallies--the people he encourages to crowd together and not wear masks-- while we hear him say those words."You breathe the air and that's how it's passed...It’s not just old, older. Young people too, plenty of young people...It's so easily transmissible, you wouldn't even believe it...It's also more deadly than even your strenuous flu.  This is deadly stuff."

 I want to see video of people right now, scared and alone and trying to breathe in hospitals, and people mourning for their loved ones who died because of covid, while we hear him say those words.

Yes, it is important to realize that, because of what he said and did, and what he didn't say and didn't do in the spring, the current White House incumbent is responsible for many more deaths than occurred on 9/11/2001.

 It is also important to understand that, whatever he said or did in February, he is even bolder now in dismissing the danger and ignoring the consequences. So he will likely be responsible for more deaths this week than happened because of  9/11, with the connivance of his administration and Republicans in Congress and in at least some state governments.  When all is said and done, his very presence could be responsible for more than three thousand deaths that could very easily result from his rallies and other gatherings where he scorns and mocks the most basic precautions.

So now, months after that awareness and into the indefinite future, most of the nation lives in terror because of Covid 19.  This is terrorism writ large.  It is happening now because of what the current administration is not doing and not saying, as well as what they are saying and doing.

What is it called when you kill people and you know what you're doing?  When you know you breathe the air and that's how it's passed, it's so easily transmissible, this is deadly stuff, and you encourage people, and sometimes insist, that people crowd together without protective masks?  I believe the legal term is murder.  Not on 5th avenue, but on global television, on the White House lawn, and probably today, on the site of American heroes who died to save others on 9-11.

Life On Mars (Updated)

Arcata Plaza Wednesday a.m. Photo from Lost Coast Outpost
By afternoon it was actually darker than this.

Update Thurs. night:  Hereabouts we had a pale yellow day but that really wasn't better because the smoke was closer to the ground and the air quality much worse.

Forecasters can't predict what's next, partly because the fires continue spewing smoke, but without much wind--yesterday (Wed.) especially was dead still--the smoke hangs around, though we are getting our fog drifting in as well.  What forecasters can say is that they expect prevailing winds to change early next week, probably sweeping out the smoke and bringing in moisture, which might even mean some light rain in the fire areas--very welcome news.  In any case, the smoke is suppressing temperatures, which may help limit new fires and allow firefighters to concentrate on existing ones.

Some of the big fires were said to grow at a slower rate today, but there are so many that firefighters can't keep track of all of them.  Oregon is hard hit, with 10% of the population under some kind of evacuation order.

Wednesday:
The smoke stayed, got thicker and darker.  It was pretty much the same from well south of San Francisco up into Oregon.  The brownish yellow world of Tuesday became the dark orange/red landscape of Mars Wednesday.  It was dark all day, with  cars using their headlights.  Forecast is for another day of this, at least.

San Francisco Wednesday.  Photo from the Atlantic.

I listen to a classical music station from Ashland, Oregon (among others), and a number of small towns have been either wiped out or suffered extensive damage near there.  More than 30 fires across that state.  California has seen more than a 2000% increase in the number of acres burned so far this summer than last summer, and there are still weeks to go in our fire season.  One fire from the south has reached into Humboldt County, and evacuations have been ordered just an hour's drive from us. Evacuees are being sheltered in Ferndale and Eureka to our south.

Fisherman statue Eureka overlooking Humboldt Bay
Wednesday.  Lost Coast Outpost photo.

The good news for us: because the dense smoke is still so high, the air remains not so toxic, within the Moderate range.  I wouldn't like to be walking the dog too many days in a row in it, but so far it's just uncomfortable to the sinuses.  I joked before I took Howdy out today that if only we had something like a mask.  It turns out most of our covid masks aren't much good for this kind of air pollution, but we do have a few of the kind that are, thanks to Margaret's collection.

 Another good thing: Rt. 101, our lifeline, is open again to the south, though that may be subject to change.   And that idiot shooting off fireworks nearby last night was arrested!

North Coast Island

Snapshot near Yosemite suggests what our skies
were like--but brighter than this.  Other snaps
from Yosemite make it look like Mars.

Hot winds were forecast to sweep across the Northwest and far northern California on Tuesday and Wednesday, so PG&E initiated one of their Public Safety Power Shutdowns, in which they take the juice out of power lines in areas where the wind and heat could enable forest fires.

This outage was scheduled to last from midnight Monday/Tuesday to Wednesday evening.  If this was last year, we wouldn't have power now, but in the interim our local alternative-fuel power plant was able to go into "island mode" and supply power directly to much of Humboldt County, particularly Arcata, Eureka and other towns.  Nevertheless, some 3,000 county residents did lose power, according to the Times Standard.

The winds did come in, and the fires that were burning are expanding, and new fires have begun--many fires, in Oregon, Washington and California.  As one result, major roads in and out of our area are closed at some point north or south, including the 101 (the most direct north/south route) and the 5 (the largest, that extends north and south but considerably east of us.)  So we are an island again.

But so far a lucky one.  We were forecast to have a record breaking high today, though a lot of place would consider 85 pretty temperate these days.  But a layer of high smoke filtered sunlight and kept things much cooler.  Otherwise we might have experienced what the southern Oregon coast did, a record-breaking 93.

We also have no fires or fire danger that close to us, at least at this time and probably this year.  On the other hand, I still hear local idiots shooting off their fireworks so who can say. (That's just how a southern California fire started that has burned 10,000 acres and counting.) We've already had some supply line problems from the closed highways but with minimal impact.

On Tuesday, the smoke turned the island world a strange brownish yellow. Walking Howdy, I noticed eerie glints on car surfaces that turned out to be sunlight, the strength of street light reflections.  The air quality here near the coast is judged to be moderate so far.  The smoke is forecast to stay overnight.  If it clears out tomorrow, the forecast is sunny and warmer than usual, though not higher than 80.  But nobody can really predict the smoke's behavior.

Poetry Monday: America

America

America, you ode for reality!
Give back the people you took.

Let the sun shine again
on the four corners of the world

you thought of first but do not
own, or keep as a convenience.

People are your own word, you
invented that locus and term.

Here, you said and say, is
where we are.  Give back

what we are, these people you made,
us, and nowhere but you to be.

Robert Creeley

from his 1969 book Pieces.