Outside the Beltway

Source: the BBC

Scenes of Devastation

A hellscape of fire and destruction.

Steven L. Taylor
96

Comments

Source: the BBC

Reuters provides some dramatic photography from the LA area wildfires: ‘The worst I’ve seen:’ Reuters visuals journalists on the LA wildfires.

I would also note this post from Kevin Drum, Elon Musk is the new emperor of misinformation, which addresses a lot of the simplistic and incorrect assertions flying around social media regarding alleged ways this could have been prevented.

The sad truth is that drought conditions and vicious dry winds were a sufficient catalyst.

The BBC reports:

A combination of an exceptionally dry period – downtown Los Angeles has only received 0.16 inches (0.4cm) of rain since October – and powerful offshore gusts known as the Santa Ana winds have created ripe conditions for wildfires.

Santa Ana winds flow east to west through southern California’s mountains, according to the National Weather Service. 

The winds can also be responsible for the scale of destruction that follows.

Blowing across the deserts further inland, they create conditions where humidity drops, which dries out vegetation. If a fire does start, the winds can fan smouldering embers into an inferno in minutes.

Speeds of 60 to 80mph (95-130km/h) are common, but gusts of up to 100mph (160km/h) can occur.

Traditionally, this should be the “rainy season” in Southern California (such as happened right after we moved to SoCal in 1983 in late November/early December and it rained most of the time–although that rain was a pittance compared to the thunderstorms I was accustomed to in Texas). A little moisture goes a long way in preventing fires. But no new moisture, low humidity, and hot winds are a recipe for disaster.

Regardless, the fact that the region is a desert to begin with, mix in drought plus hot, dry winds (the Santa Ana’s really are something else) and all it takes is a spark to start a fire and then for the fire to spread. It is always tempting to assert that something could have been done to have prevented all of this, but I am not seeing it (but am open to being corrected).

People who are using this moment to make cheap political points are, however, heartless ghouls.

I hope that any OTB readers in the area are safe.

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96 responses to “Scenes of Devastation”

  1. CSK Avatar
    CSK

    There’s nothing to say.

    3
  2. Charley in Cleveland Avatar
    Charley in Cleveland

    That Trump and Musk feel compelled to use a disaster to “own the libs” proves the old maxim (adjusted for inflation) that if you give an asshole a Billion dollars, all you get in return is a Billionaire asshole.

    11
  3. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2025/01/10/palisades-fire-satellite-images-los-angeles-damage/

    2
  4. inhumans99 Avatar
    inhumans99

    I mentioned this in the Tuesday Open Thread (belated thanks to your reply to my post CSK), but my family is lucky that they do not live directly in the fire zones. My sister lives in Sherman Oaks, pretty much right near Ventura Blvd (you can quickly walk to the Blvd from her home), which was near some nasty spot fires that broke out and took down homes and businesses, and is not all that far from the fire that broke out in Hollywood Hills, and my Mom still lives in the home our family grew up in in the San Fernando Valley and is in walking distance to the Ritchie Valens Recreation Center (where I spent many a day in the summer as a kid, but it was just a park then and the Recreation Center had yet to be built, but the center has been around for decades as of this point in time), so the fact that fire evacuee’s were set up at locations right around her neighborhood shows that she was not that far from the fire (but far enough that it was indeed safe to house evacuee’s at these locations).

    Our family feels very fortunate and profoundly sad for anyone who was directly impacted by the fire.

    This is really not a good look for MAGA, and Musk and will eventually catch up with them in probably around 2026 (not that far off in the future when you really think about it), it is hard to find evidence at this moment that what I am about to say is true, but I do believe that there are indeed limits to how much of an uncaring a-hole you can be before folks start to turn on you.

    6
  5. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    Regardless, the fact that the region is a desert to begin with, mix in drought plus hot, dry winds (the Santa Ana’s really are something else) and all it takes is a spark to start a fire and then for the fire to spread. It is always tempting to assert that something could have been done to have prevented all of this, but I am not seeing it (but am open to being corrected).

    We’ll have to wait for the after-action-reports, but in general, the conditions that led to these fires have long been known features of the area. It’s not as if this kind of event was unpredictable or unpredicted except in regard to the specific timing. If it’s actually the case that “nothing” could have been done, then that bodes ill for the other similarly vulnerable areas that have been spared this time around.

    3
  6. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    It’s not as if this kind of event was unpredictable or unpredicted except in regard to the specific timing. If it’s actually the case that “nothing” could have been done, then that bodes ill for the other similarly vulnerable areas that have been spared this time around.

    I agree that this was not impossible to predict. It is likewise “predictable” that there will some day be a massive quake on the San Andreas and that a Cat-5 hurricane could hit Tampa Bay directly (and I am not being snarky and also recognize that the exact probabilities of all these things vary).

    While, clearly, the idea that nothing could have been done is probably wrong, I am less convinced that much could have been done (and so, yes, this bodes ill for the future).

    I almost stated in the OP that the only solutions I can think of require time travel (but that seemed too flippant).

    7
  7. EddieInCA Avatar
    EddieInCA

    @Andy:

    We’ll have to wait for the after-action-reports, but in general, the conditions that led to these fires have long been known features of the area.

    No. Justno. You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.

    1. We normally don’t have Santa Ana winds in January.

    2 Average rainfall this time of year is 3.5 inches. Currently for the season it’s 0.04 inches.

    3. I’ve lived here my whole life, and I can guaran-damn-tee you that we’ve never had 100 mile an hour winds, in January, during drout conditions, when humidity was under 10%.

    So just stop it.

    This is a continuation of what we have seen across the country. Things that used to be normal have now been ramped up by anywhere from 50 to 100%. Hurricanes. Floods. Fires. Tsunamis.

    No. The conditions for this were not well known so stop with the bullshit. This is all new.

    25
  8. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Steven L. Taylor: Por ejemplo, we could keep electing Democratic presidents and congresses, so we could continue passing historic climate change legislation like Biden did. That would help mitigate contributing problems like monthslong drought, January heat, and hurricane-force dry winter wind gusts. Then Southern California might retain its rainy season, like the ones you remember from way back yonder.

    But then right, center, and left would have to stop being manipulated by dumb propaganda about trans, gays, wokeness, DEI, neoliberalism, CRT, border/crime/inflation, “iT’s NATO’s fAuLt” and “Genocide Joe” — thus allowing climate change deniers and handmaidens of the fossil fuel lobby to slither back into power every 2-4 years. We could stop letting our energy policy be hamstrung by “but muh daddy and grandpappy worked in coal mines and oil fields so I and my kids have to.”

    Getting from Point A to Point B, that’s a tough road. But yes, a time machine to go back a quarter century and somehow get Al Gore into the presidency would be nice.

    7
  9. inhumans99 Avatar
    inhumans99

    Those reports that Andy mentioned that are indeed coming in the days and weeks ahead. Those reports will of course point out that many hydrant hook ups lasted for a while to provide water, until they did not. It was never realistic that so many fire hoses hooked up to so many hydrants at the same time would not eventually drain the water available to fight fires, hydrant hooks ups are designed to help a firefighter tamp down a fire at maybe a business/home or two, and allow them to spray a full blast of water for perhaps a few hours in a row.

    Firehose hydrant hook up by the hundreds (thousands?) at the same time where a full blast of water may be needed to run for 3, 4, 5+(!) hours in a row to save a structure, that is nuts to expect that the hydrants would not eventually run low on water under those circumstances.

    Andy, I agree that this does not bode well for future events that could happen in areas unaffected this time around. Interesting times we live in.

    I would also like to note as a resident of the Bay Area who has been up here for enough years (over 20 years at this point, a bit less than half the time in San Jose, and since 2010 in the East Bay) to have seen how many devastating fires have broke out in and around the Bay Area, that simply having lots of access to water does not mean you can prevent a catastrophe. Lots of Bay Area, Wine Country, etc., fires have been large, catastrophic, and killers (with dozens dead in some instances) and yet all of this water that is around the Bay Area (lakes, reservoirs, etc.) was still not enough to prevent some of these fires from being in the top 10 of worst fire disasters in CA history.

    This is why Musk sounds so shockingly uninformed and just plain dumb when he rages against CA “policies” that prevented firefighters from saving the structures in places like Pacific Palisades. Extreme winds speeds, overgrown but bone dry vegetation that is not easily accessible terrain by vehicles, is indeed a recipe for disaster if a fire flares up like it did the past few days.

    I want any plans put forward to thin out our forests to help make it easier to get control of future wildfires in CA to be very transparent and accessible to all citizens of CA, but yes…I might put some blame on CA citizens who yell and scream that all of those dead trees that were not cut down helped make the fires we experience worse, but at the same time make it hard for politicians to enact policies making it easier and faster to manage our forests.

    I do understand the urge to be careful in not accidentally creating a policy that makes it all too easy to wreck our forests, destroying a big component of what makes CA such a wonderful state to live in is not the solution. If a GOP politician could put forth with sincerity a plan that would help manage our forests without the plan really being a stealth way to let the timber industry run roughshod over our forests, I really could see myself voting for such a politician.

    Even with thinned out forests, if we want to keep our CA forests as grand and majestic as they are, we are going to have to accept that future wildfires will continue to be more destructive than usual due to abundant availability of fuel for the fire (brush, vegetation, trees). Getting rid of too much of this fuel diminishes the state of CA.

    I have lived in this state for over 50 years (almost as native a Californian as you can be, having lived in the state since I was 2 years old, (28 years just in the San Fernando Valley), and like many of my fellow citizens in CA accept that we risk wildfires to keep places like Yosemite as grand as they are.

    9
  10. JKB Avatar
    JKB

    Controlled burns to remove forest floor detritus and low brush has along scientific history and was even used by native tribes in North America in the 17th century. In places like CA, the problem is magnified by the suppression of small wildfires in less dangerous conditions instead of letting them run the forest floor. This also applies to cutting away low limbs that can allow the fire to climb and candle trees. Both of which are not permitted by government policy

    The water issue will need more investigation. Yes, CA releases water to the sea that could be used for not only potable water, but fire suppression but the intervening part is the reservoirs and what level they were brought to before the fully forecast drought period.

    3
  11. Argon Avatar
    Argon

    They’ll need to prepare for the follow-up risks of floods and mudslides that these fires create.

    7
  12. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    If this were a regular occurrence it would have occurred before this, and it has not. Forests burn, houses in the forests burn, fucking Pacific Palisades does not burn to the ground. Lifeguard towers on the beach, surrounded by sand, have burned.

    We are in for more fires, more droughts, more hurricanes and tornados. Note that those last two items occur almost exclusively in Red States. Make the world hot and shit burns. Who could have guessed?

    7
  13. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    @JKB:
    So, we should have had controlled burns in housing developments in Pacific Palisades?

    7
  14. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @EddieInCA:

    that we’ve never had 100 mile an hour winds, in January

    An excellent point.

    This is a continuation of what we have seen across the country. Things that used to be normal have now been ramped up by anywhere from 50 to 100%. Hurricanes. Floods. Fires. Tsunamis.

    Also this.

    7
  15. inhumans99 Avatar
    inhumans99

    @JKB:

    JKB, when CA does not let (perhaps due to Mother Nature overwhelming an area with way too much rain in too short a period of time) a lot of that rain water drain to the Pacific Ocean you get things like Tulare Lake, which used to exist as part of California’s landscape, and when it went away lots of business interests and citizens rushed in to build on the lakebed that was once Tulare Lake.

    Will those same citizens and business interests let the lake be a lake from this point forward (lots of rainwater was captured by this lake that did not end up in the ocean)? Lots of competing business interests that make it harder than it sounds in soundbites to keep most of the water from rainfall inside of CA for us to use instead of letting it go to the ocean.

    Those same folks that put up signs that say CA needs politicians to build more dams that I always see driving down to Los Angeles to see my Mom are some of the same folks who would squeal like a stuck pig if Newsom said sure, we have the perfect spot for a new dam/reservoir or two, but we need to tear down your pistachio tree grove, etc., as it is right in a spot that is ideal to capture a ton of rainwater to keep the water from draining to the Pacific Ocean.

    The very same folks doing much of the bellyaching are the ones who have benefited the most from current CA policies. As is oftentimes the case in life.

    There are trade-offs in life when you want something done, these same folks whining about needing more dams/reservoirs in CA, could they tell me with a straight face that they would be willing to accept the trade-off of losing some property to the state of CA needed to create these water storage solutions, property that has helped them in some cases make hundreds of millions of dollars from growing food in CA.

    Again, I said could they say this to me with a straight face, building more dams/reservoirs could prevent some very powerful agricultural interests from making millions more in profit every year. Would these business interest accept the trade-off, more water is captured so it available during drought years, but it will definitely come with a price.

    6
  16. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @JKB:

    Controlled burns to remove forest floor detritus and low brush has along scientific history and was even used by native tribes in North America in the 17th century.

    This is true and I do not dispute it.

    But it is utterly unclear to me how such controlled burns would have prevented the Pacific Palisades fire, just to name one. Or, really, any of these fires.

    To my recollection (but I will admit it has been a while), Pasadena is not built in the middle of a forest.

    I drove through the Palisades area just under two years ago. While there are plenty vegetated hills, I am not sure that forest management is the issue.

    Indeed, with the conditions we are talking about (less than half a centimeter of rain since October) even controlled burns are dangerous.

    Regardless, even if every possible vegetation management issue could have been deployed, how do you prevent fires with drought and high dry winds? One ember is enough to start a fire, and then a small fire quickly becomes many large ones.

    4
  17. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Michael Reynolds: Exactly.

    2
  18. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    My overall reaction to the “forest management” and “controlled burns” assertions is that people are engaging in abstractions and simplistic answers with not actually knowledge of the topography and basic conditions.

    9
  19. Kathy Avatar
    Kathy

    What Governor Newsom should do is admit he’s not great and rich enough to handle this situation, and appoint the felon and President Xlon to mange the fires, since they claim to know exactly what to do and how.

    3
  20. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @EddieInCA:

    The fact that it occurred in January may be new, but none of the relevant factors (winds, dryness, fuel load, etc.) are new. One might expect this to be much more likely in a normally hot/dry season than now but don’t try to tell me that just because this occurred during an unusual time of year that it was unpredictable, and, therefore, nothing could be done.

    and:

    Things that used to be normal have now been ramped up by anywhere from 50 to 100%. Hurricanes. Floods. Fires. Tsunamis.

    To the extent this characterization is accurate, it directly argues against your main point. We’ve known about the potential effects of climate change for a very long time, to include unusual weather patterns that have devastatingly exacerbated these fires. So throwing up one’s hands and suggesting nothing could be done because no one could have predicted this is just bullshit, dude.

    So one needs to factor in climate change to plans and preparation. That obviously is a pretty big challenge, even in a deep blue place like CA.

    And to DK’s point about electing Democrats, the reality is that the effects of climate change cannot be reduced except on multi-decade scales with concerted global action. Even if the US was able to go net zero tomorrow, the global carbon load (and climate change) would continue to increase thanks to what the rest of the world is doing. We will be living with this for a long time regardless of what we do, and therefore, we have to prepare for that reality.

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    It is likewise “predictable” that there will some day be a massive quake on the San Andreas and that a Cat-5 hurricane could hit Tampa Bay directly (and I am not being snarky and also recognize that the exact probabilities of all these things vary).

    Yes, and SF and Florida have policies and building codes intended to at least ameliorate those contingencies, which are only a matter of time. Are they sufficient for the worst case? Probably not. Nothing rarely is (see below).

    As far as California goes, this fire may be a wake-up call in the way that Hurricane Andrew was for Florida. I find it highly unlikely that experts and politicians will not implement changes from this disaster, which would prove the point.

    @inhumans99:

    Those reports will of course point out that many hydrant hook ups lasted for a while to provide water, until they did not. It was never realistic that so many fire hoses hooked up to so many hydrants at the same time would not eventually drain the water available to fight fires, hydrant hooks ups are designed to help a firefighter tamp down a fire at maybe a business/home or two, and allow them to spray a full blast of water for perhaps a few hours in a row.

    I think this is one of those things that will be looked at. Unlike the right-wing CA critics, I don’t fault LA or CA for not having enough water capacity because everything in life comes with tradeoffs. Except in rare cases, you can’t have fully redundant systems built for true worst-case scenarios. Any system will have capacity constraints, and I think LA and CA will reexamine the fire system capacity constraints as one lesson from this.

  21. gVOR10 Avatar
    gVOR10

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    My overall reaction to the “forest management” and “controlled burns” assertions is that people are engaging in abstractions and simplistic answers with not actually knowledge of the topography and basic conditions.

    Indeed. And if you look at conservative sites, doing so in overwhelming numbers. If only CA had raked their forests.

    4
  22. Jay L Gischer Avatar
    Jay L Gischer

    @JKB: It’s one thing to have a controlled burn in a national forest far from any concentration of population, and quite another to have one in what amounts to the empty lot next to your house. Which is the situation in California.

    Also there’s the scale of things involved, and the difficulty of the terrain. It seems to me you don’t appreciate either how big, or how mountainous California is.

    To be sure, Prop 13 is an issue here as well. By eroding the tax base, it makes it harder for local communities to build infrastructure. You know, things like bigger water tanks.

    6
  23. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    My overall reaction to the “forest management” and “controlled burns” assertions is that people are engaging in abstractions and simplistic answers with not actually knowledge of the topography and basic conditions.

    Well, this topic has been extensively studied, and it’s well understood that the century-plus-long policy of combatting all wildfires in the nation’s forests has led to a significant increase in fuel loads that make fires, when they happen, much worse. This isn’t a controversial view.

    The problem is that addressing that issue is very challenging. Manually clearing is very expensive and labor-intensive. Controlled burns in areas with a high fuel load destroy the forest (not manage it) and can be dangerous and difficult to control.

  24. wr Avatar
    wr

    @EddieInCA: “The conditions for this were not well known so stop with the bullshit.”

    But if we pretend they were, then we can continue to pretend that everything is actually under our control and that anything that goes wrong is simply the fault of our political opponents.

    I particularly like the cries of “why didn’t they build vast fire-fighting infrastructure and require all houses to be built of stone or steel” coming from the same people who spend the rest of their time screaming about how taxes are evil and regulations are tyranny. (Not referring to Andy here!)

    8
  25. gVOR10 Avatar
    gVOR10

    @EddieInCA:

    Things that used to be normal have now been ramped up by anywhere from 50 to 100%. Hurricanes. Floods. Fires. Tsunamis.

    It’s common practice to look at old records and design for the event you can expect once in a hundred years. Climate change has made that unrealistic.

    My brother used to live in Moorhead MN, across the Red River from Fargo ND. The Red can flood in the spring. It runs north, to Hudson’s Bay. Snowmelt drains into it and sometimes ice jams down river (north) block it. The Red River valley is pool table flat. If the river is a foot over its banks, the water floods a mile from the river. Some years ago Fargo broke down and did some serious flood control work after, IIRC, their third flood of the century in two decades.

    4
  26. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Michael Reynolds: “Lifeguard towers on the beach, surrounded by sand, have burned.”

    If you look at the helicopter footage from the LA Times, one thing that stands out is the miles-long strip of houses that sit between the Pacific Coast Highway and the beach is all gone. And PS — there is no forest there, no trees, just asphalt on one side and sand on the other.

    Don’t know about you, but I’m getting really sick of the lectures about letting people rebuild houses in areas that have burned multiple times. That may well be the case in the hills above Malibu, but both Pacific Palisades and Pasadena were filled with houses built 57 or 100 or 125 years ago.

    All you people who have suddenly become experts on California, water and fires, could you just shut the fuck up for a couple of days while we deal with our grief over loved ones who have lost everything and the loss of some of the most beautiful communities in the country? There will plenty of time for ignorant yapping in a week or so.

    16
  27. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    As far as California goes, this fire may be a wake-up call in the way that Hurricane Andrew was for Florida. I find it highly unlikely that experts and politicians will not implement changes from this disaster, which would prove the point.

    You are conflating “what could have been done” with “what will be done after.”

    I have little doubt that there will be responses and lesson learned. But that is not what I was raising. I am doubtful that there is some glaring obvious thing that could realistically have been done to prevent this. Certainly it isn’t about forest management or water pressure.

    3
  28. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy: But forests and urban/suburban areas are not the same thing. And ignoring that fact is kind of annoying in these conversations

    3
  29. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    And just to point something out, when Texas had the unusual freeze a couple years that broke their electrical and water systems, there sure were a lot of liberals pointing fingers in a very schadenfreude way. The takes were a bit different then, glass houses and all that.

    That was a similar example of something predictable not only because it had happened before, but also because experts predicted it. Yet, it wasn’t adequately prepared for, and the criticism was immediate and largely justified.

    2
  30. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    By making the climate hotter, climate change also makes the weather patterns more powerful and more unpredictable.
    So the rainfall patterns become more erratic, and winds and storms become stronger because there is more heat energy fueling them.

    While “A wildfire in January powered by Santa Ana winds” wasn’t predictable, the overall risk has long been identified as an outcome of a changing climate.

    Climate change is no long some science fiction hypothetical, it is now history and we are living in it.

    3
  31. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    Yes, and SF and Florida have policies and building codes intended to at least ameliorate those contingencies, which are only a matter of time

    And to this point: but when a cat-5 hits directly on a major city, even those policies won’t prevent substantial devastation. Likewise, a big enough quake will create massive havoc.

    My point is not that we can’t learn and try to adapt and ameliorate, but it is that some events are surprisingly catastrophic that truly preparing for is nigh on impossible.

    We agree that there will be lessons learned.

    But I lean more toward the “this bodes badly for the future” and less towards, “this is preventable” (at least within acceptable costs).

    I definitely think that blaming water management policies and lack of forest-raking (or whatever) is silliness (if not gross).

    7
  32. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @wr:

    If you look at the helicopter footage from the LA Times, one thing that stands out is the miles-long strip of houses that sit between the Pacific Coast Highway and the beach is all gone. And PS — there is no forest there, no trees, just asphalt on one side and sand on the other.

    Exactly.

    I drove right through there two years ago this April.

    1
  33. DK Avatar
    DK

    @wr: Much lulz have been had on social media this week dunking on Wes Nichols — a billionare techbro libertarian who has spent years tweeting against state and federal taxes, proposing California eliminate social services.

    Of course, as his property caught aflame, he was first in line to decry alleged lack of firefighter resources.

    7
  34. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy: I would note that the Texas electrical grid is far more a specific policy choice than anything we are seeing in LA at the moment.

    Although both events are linked to climate change.

    Is the issue here really comparative partisan schadenfreude? That seems inappropriate at the moment, TBH.

    3
  35. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    You are conflating “what could have been done” with “what will be done after.”

    Look, when retrospectives are done, whether it’s 9/11, the Texas grid going down, or the various destructive fires in California, there are always things that come out that were known issues that were not acted upon for whatever reason but should have been. I highly doubt this case will be any different. I am not presuming what those factors may be, but I’m pretty confident that failures of governance, planning, and preparation will, in some way or aspect, be part of it, because such things are always identified post-hoc. As noted before, I’m not here to get over my skis and predetermine what those will be with any certainty, one way or another.

    But forests and urban/suburban areas are not the same thing. And ignoring that fact is kind of annoying in these conversations

    These fires started in forests that were directly adjacent to the neighborhoods that were destroyed, and the winds blew the flames from those forests into the neighborhoods. Ignoring that fact is also annoying.

    It may be the case that nothing could have been reasonably done, but fires on urban/forest boundaries are exceedingly common. Again, that’s not a criticism of CA or LA, but I would expect that this is something that will be looked at in after-action reports.

    I am doubtful that there is some glaring obvious thing that could realistically have been done to prevent this. Certainly it isn’t about forest management or water pressure.

    How can you be certain of that?

    My view is that those factors are definitely on the table for consideration, and it’s a mistake at this point to conclude definitively one way or the other whether something could have been done related to those two factors.

    1
  36. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @Andy:
    The most obvious glaring Thing That Could Have Been Done is what climate scientists were discussing 30 some years ago but no one wanted to listen.

    The devastating fires/floods/hurricanes/tornados of 2054 can be prevented right now by following those same recommendations of decarbonizing our industrial and transportation systems.

    8
  37. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    I would note that the Texas electrical grid is far more a specific policy choice than anything we are seeing in LA at the moment.

    I’d be heaping schadenfreude-tinged critical hot takes on California Democrats had they spent decades a) fighting against efforts to mitigate catastrophic climate change like Texas’s Republicans leaders do, and b) privatizing and isolating forest and water management to avoid regulation and federal oversight like Texas leaders vis a vis their electoral grid.

    But CalDems didn’t do that.

    Reflexive bothsidesism is an easy fallback, but not everything is as similar on second glance as at first. Postmortems will find areas where Cali citizens erred in not yet building an innovative vision for responding-in-advance to our dangerously changed climate, but it’s not likely to resemble the errors and needs of Texas, Hawaii, Florida, N. Carolina, and New York.

    How much would a countywide forest-and-canyon area emergency sprinkler system cost L.A. County? Malibu, Pacific Palisades, the Hollywood Hills, Bel Air, Brentwood, and Pasadena contain some of the wealthiest zip codes in the world, after all.

    5
  38. Kathy Avatar
    Kathy

    “Any damn fool can predict the past,” Larry Niven.

    9
  39. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    I would note that the Texas electrical grid is far more a specific policy choice than anything we are seeing in LA at the moment.

    Disagree. Fire preparation, mitigation, etc. are also policy choices. And you are presuming, before the facts are in, whether CA/LA policy choices were a factor in these fires compared to Texas. The reality is that we don’t really know yet. I’m merely pointing out the historical fact that the vast majority of after-actions for disasters identify policy errors that were or should have been known to be errors before the fact. I’m simply suggesting that this won’t be an exception. How that manifests is yet to be seen and I’m not one of those who is going to jump to certain conclusions on any specific issue, one way or another.

    Is the issue here really comparative partisan schadenfreude? That seems inappropriate at the moment, TBH.

    That’s not the issue at all, it’s a complete side-show. I’m just pointing out the hypocrisy of partisanship and partisans and ideologues being partisans and ideologues (I don’t include you in this, BTW). The dumb partisans whine when their side/state is implicated in criticisms, yet love to point fingers when the other side is implicated. I find it highly annoying that people do this.

    3
  40. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Andy: ” Yet, it wasn’t adequately prepared for, and the criticism was immediate and largely justified.”

    So that means the bad-faith criticism of California is also largely justified? Brings a whole new level to both-sidesism.

    4
  41. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @Chip Daniels:

    The most obvious glaring Thing That Could Have Been Done is what climate scientists were discussing 30 some years ago but no one wanted to listen.

    The devastating fires/floods/hurricanes/tornados of 2054 can be prevented right now by following those same recommendations of decarbonizing our industrial and transportation systems.

    Coulda-shoulda-woulda is an excuse. One has to deal with reality as it is, not blame things that didn’t happen decades ago.

    Furthermore, it’s well understood – at least by non-luddites – that you can’t decarbonize an economy quickly, especially in a democracy. We in the US have done a very good job at bending the curve to the point where our emissions have flattened and started to decline. But as I noted in a comment above, we could go net zero tomorrow and it would not materially change the global trajectory, only delay things by a few years.

    That is the reality. We have to deal with that reality in the here and now and understand that climate change is a difficult long-term problem that can’t and won’t be addressed quickly, probably not in our lifetimes.

    1
  42. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    Disagree. Fire preparation, mitigation, etc. are also policy choices. And you are presuming, before the facts are in, whether CA/LA policy choices were a factor in these fires compared to Texas.

    As a general matter, sure.

    But let’s be specific.

    What policy choice are you citing in CA that is equivalent to Texas purposefully not connecting to the larger national grid?

    I’m merely pointing out the historical fact that the vast majority of after-actions for disasters identify policy errors that were or should have been known to be errors before the fact. I’m simply suggesting that this won’t be an exception.

    And I am not arguing otherwise.

    Quite clearly the initial point was that people bellyaching over “raking the forests” or complaining about smelts are trolling and not being serious.

    Can we at least agree on that?

    And, moreover, I feel like you are utterly ignoring the actual conditions on the ground in terms of understanding the scope of this particular event.

    Given the dryness and the wind any flame anywhere could have sparked wider fires.

    It is like when Helene hit Ashville–I know there are things that could have been done to mitigate, and lessons will be learned, but that doesn’t mean it was specifically predictable (save in a genera sense as per Chip’s comments) or that the damage could reasonably have been prevented.

    We agree thaht lessons will be learned. I am not saying no one should escape criticism.

  43. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Andy: Andy — I realize you have a reflexive need to stand apart from and above all those ideologues who refuse to see the Obvious Truth with your Clear-Eyed Vision, and thus you now must lecture us all on how foolish ideologues have failed, and only if they were as wise as you, then all would have been good — even though you have no idea what you’re talking about.

    And that’s fine. You be you.

    But for God’s sake, if all you want is to use this unbelievable tragedy to illustrate your superiority over the masses, could you have the common decency to wait until the flames are out and the ground is cool enough for people to walk on to see the sites where they once lived their lives?

    I promise not to object, no matter how holy you get on the subject. Maybe if you even just waited until people stopped dying, even that would be okay.

    And if you want to chide me for being emotional and thus lacking your steely insight, you’re damn right. I’ve been in tears every day when I see the places I used to live and the people I still love. Sorry if that makes me weak in your eyes.

    9
  44. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @Andy:
    We can, right now, take steps to prevent future disasters by reducing carbonization and finding renewable energy sources.

    It doesn’t have to be a partisan issue, but somehow it ends up being one.

    6
  45. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    How can you be certain of that?

    I have fallen into the rhetorical trap of making an absolute statement that logically cannot be defended, as I cannot be certain.

    I am, however, highly doubtful that a reasonable set of policies could have prevented this.

    Yes, not developing certainly places could have prevented this. Not building LA where LA was built would help, for example.

    Building homes out of something other than wood would have mattered, I suppose.

    I think, too, a lot of people are thinking “forest” and not understanding the scrubby hills of SoCal. We aren’t talking, in a lot of these cases, tall trees and underbrush that can be cleared. We are talking, in many cases, just brush. How do you take all that fuel out of the picture when you have .4 cm of rain in a three-month span?

    I guess I would appreciate some acknowledgment that the conditions here were very difficult and are conducive to the outcomes rather than insistence that we will learn something later (which I am not disputing).

    3
  46. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    The vast majority of lost homes were stucco and Spanish tile, neither being particularly fire-prone. Brick is a non-starter because in an earthquake brick buildings collapse. So, what have we got? Limestone slab walls and steel roofs? Honestly asking: how do you build a fireproof and earthquake-proof home?

    6
  47. Jay L Gischer Avatar
    Jay L Gischer

    It seems relevant to point out that the NorCal fires from a few years ago, the ones Trump first complained about “sweeping the forest floor” about, were caused by the negligence of a private actor – PG&E – which has since gone into bankruptcy and reorganization because it can’t actually pay the damages that were awarded against it.

    So. No “policy failure” there, really. We don’t yet know how this one started, so maybe we can slow down our conclusions about what could have been done. Or maybe we can’t.

    Of course, in almost any situation, there was something someone could have done to make the situation less bad. Always. So one can always find someone to try to shift the blame to.

    3
  48. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    These fires started in forests that were directly adjacent to the neighborhoods that were destroyed, and the winds blew the flames from those forests into the neighborhoods. Ignoring that fact is also annoying.

    Who is ignoring this? Although, again, more brush fire than forest fire, at least as I understand it.

    This matters only insofar as “forest management” can be considered a culprit.

    BTW, farmers do controled burns all around me at certain times of the year to prepare their fields for the next season. I don’t worry about those fires getting out of control because things are pretty wet and green around here (and I am surrounded by grassy pastures). In CA such burns would make me very, very nervous because it is brown and dry in CA.

    2
  49. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Andy:

    That is the reality. We have to deal with that reality in the here and now and understand that climate change is a difficult long-term problem that can’t and won’t be addressed quickly, probably not in our lifetimes.

    On this we agree.

    2
  50. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Chip Daniels:

    The most obvious glaring Thing That Could Have Been Done is what climate scientists were discussing 30 some years ago but no one wanted to listen.

    Where does Al Gore go to get his apology?

    Even as a nerdy kid way too much into adult stuff, I was confused why the focus of the 2000 election was who you’d rather have a beer with. Oh, and Gore’s debate sighing and the supposedly incomprehensible nature of his Social Security Lockbox.

    That was quaint. We’re such a smart, serious people politically. /s

    9
  51. EddieInCA Avatar
    EddieInCA

    @Andy:

    These fires started in forests that were directly adjacent to the neighborhoods that were destroyed, and the winds blew the flames from those forests into the neighborhoods.

    That’s just wrong. Again you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. There are no forests surrounding Pacific Palisades. There are no forests in Malibu. There are barely any trees in those areas. It is mostly scrub brush and the trees they have are sparse and separated.

    Have you ever even been to this area? Doesn’t seem so by the fucking idiotic bullshit you’re spouting.

    5
  52. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @wr:

    @Andy: ” Yet, it wasn’t adequately prepared for, and the criticism was immediate and largely justified.”

    So that means the bad-faith criticism of California is also largely justified? Brings a whole new level to both-sidesism.

    To spell it out for you, I think in the future, there will be justified, good-faith criticisms of California’s and/or LA’s preparation and response once all the facts are in and people can analyze the full scope of the event. My point is that we don’t know what those justified criticisms are yet but there will likely be some, and the various people who are making certain and declarative statements one way or the other are out over their skis. It may turn out that the criticisms coming from the right-wing that the left-wingers are upset about will turn out to be true. It may be that they won’t. Historically, it’s a mixed bag.

    This was true for the Texas 2021 power event and pretty much every other catastrophic disaster. The early reporting, accusations, and theories were often wrong or only partly right when final reports were issued (reports that few read and fewer blog about and write strident comments on).

    3
  53. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @Michael Reynolds:
    There are ways to make houses more fire-resistant and those are great, but in firestorms the leading edge can put out such superheated air and radiant heat that the furniture and other fuel inside a house spontaneously combust, exploding it from the inside out.
    Not to mention the vehicles pared on driveways and streets.
    This is why it can sweep through any ordinary suburban development like a string of firecrackers.

    The phenomenon of firestorms isn’t mysterious- people have been studying them for over a century. And both the steps needed to prevent them and address them are well known, just politically difficult.
    And again, climate change is making it even more difficult because of what I mentioned upthread, that it supercharges everything.

    4
  54. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @Steven L. Taylor:
    We actually CAN address climate change. Its not like the climate change has stopped- its going to continue to get worse and worse with each degree of heat.

    And like I said, it shouldn’t be a partisan issue, but to be blunt, the best way to prevent the future disasters is to stop voting for Republicans.

    3
  55. Gustopher Avatar
    Gustopher

    @Andy:

    Disagree. Fire preparation, mitigation, etc. are also policy choices. And you are presuming, before the facts are in, whether CA/LA policy choices were a factor in these fires compared to Texas

    Given the conditions, the fires are predictable.

    Few people would expect 100mph dry winds, 10% humidity, and record low rainfall. That tends to make preparation difficult..

    There’s also the simple fact that traditionally, it’s been cheaper and easier to contain fires when they happen and deal with the (then limited) consequences than somehow fireproof the entire state. There are tradeoffs there that will always leave room for second guessing. But, all those tradeoffs are made with an expectation of what conditions are at all likely to occur. They’re looking for a solution somewhere between stacking all the dry kindling against houses, and enclosing cities in glass bubbles.

    Droughts in California are common. 100mph winds in a drought is — I believe — unheard of.

    6
  56. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @wr:

    Andy — I realize you have a reflexive need to stand apart from and above all those ideologues who refuse to see the Obvious Truth with your Clear-Eyed Vision, and thus you now must lecture us all on how foolish ideologues have failed, and only if they were as wise as you, then all would have been good — even though you have no idea what you’re talking about.

    And that’s fine. You be you.

    But for God’s sake, if all you want is to use this unbelievable tragedy to illustrate your superiority over the masses, could you have the common decency to wait until the flames are out and the ground is cool enough for people to walk on to see the sites where they once lived their lives?

    That is your interpretation, and an incorrect one. It’s an interpretation that says a lot more about you than it does me. You seem perennially unable to handle the idea of disagreement that doesn’t come from right-wing partisanship and characterize it instead as this superiority theory. You seem intellectually unable to chalk it up to a disagreement, or different perspectives or whatever – regardless of the case, you have to personalize it as a character flaw. Your belief that you understand what really motivates me (always something negative, natch) is getting annoying.

    And contra what you suggest – and quite obviously – my position is that I don’t have the obvious truth and clear-eyed vision, much less superiority on this. I’m specifically saying we need to wait for all the facts and analysis before making definitive judgments. Yet somehow, you interpret this as wanting “to use this unbelievable tragedy to illustrate [my] superiority over the masses.” What a mind-reader you think you are! In fact, it’s quite the opposite, I think what’s necessary here is intellectual humility, not the kind of partisan combat that you and others endlessly want to engage in.

    @Steven L. Taylor:

    I am, however, highly doubtful that a reasonable set of policies could have prevented this.

    Fair enough. Maybe in a few months, we can revisit this and see how things turned out.

    @EddieInCA:

    That’s just wrong. Again you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. There are no forests surrounding Pacific Palisades. There are no forests in Malibu. There are barely any trees in those areas. It is mostly scrub brush and the trees they have are sparse and separated.

    Have you ever even been to this area? Doesn’t seem so by the fucking idiotic bullshit you’re spouting.

    I’ve been there lots of times. I haven’t hiked above Malibu, but did a lot of hiking down the road at Pt. Mugu SP and across the way in the Angeles National Forest and many other parts of southern CA. Not, it’s not the Hoh river valley rain forest. If you want to get wrapped up in semantics about what constitutes a “forest” then fine, we can call it scrub land or whatever. The point is these fires didn’t start (based on what we know, which is subject to change) in the middle of Malibu (and other urban areas) and then spread, they were wildfires that spread into the adject urban areas. Your contention that no one had any idea this could happen is what is the real bullshit.

    2
  57. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Andy:

    These fires started in forests that were directly adjacent to the neighborhoods that were destroyed, and the winds blew the flames from those forests into the neighborhoods. Ignoring that fact is also annoying.

    Eh, not precisely.

    The Palisades fire, the worst one, allegedly started in someone’s backyard.

    The Eaton (Pasadena/Altadena) fire allegedly started under an electrical tower at the end of residential street.

    The Sunset fire is believed to have started at Runyon Canyon, L.A.’s most heavily-trafficked hiking trail, largely paved. This was quickly contained with air drops from the nearby Hollywood Reservoir.

    These places are not un-managed. L.A.’s geography is often thought of as urban + palm trees and beaches. But there is also an expansive green belt of wealthy neighborhoods in hills/mountains/canyons splitting L.A. proper from “The Valley” and running from the beach on the west out east into wilderness areas that rise above the desert.

    It’s unusual the fires grew so large; they didn’t start in the more remote east. They started in the western communities. Neighborhoods with vegetation — narrow streets, and canyon-like, difficult terrain — but that thousands pass through daily. Typically, the excess human eyeballs and lack of undergrowth thanks to constant foot traffic would have allowed authorities to quickly put out these fires.

    But residents of Altadena saw that fire ignite under the electrical tower; it’s on surveillance footage. By the time fire personnel arrived 10 minutes later, it was already a mess. Even the Runyon Canyon fire quickly grew oddly large for such a well-maintained public park.

    4
  58. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @Michael Reynolds:

    The vast majority of lost homes were stucco and Spanish tile, neither being particularly fire-prone. Brick is a non-starter because in an earthquake brick buildings collapse. So, what have we got? Limestone slab walls and steel roofs? Honestly asking: how do you build a fireproof and earthquake-proof home?

    Here in Colorado, the Lousiville/Marshall fire – the most destructive (IIRC) in state history – burned down a Costco – little to no wood there, it’s cinder block and steel mainly.

    Hardening buildings can only do so much. Wind-driven fire can jump large gaps (like parking lots and roads).

    Like most difficult problems, I suspect the answer is like an onion – you need layers of different mitigation, prevention, and response efforts to really be effective. And even then that may not be enough.

  59. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @DK:

    Thanks for the additional info and context. The initial reports I heard were that the Palisades fire started on the hillside, grew quickly, and then blew down into the neighborhood with the winds.

    Time to take my own advice about waiting for all the facts…

    2
  60. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Andy: Your facts were not far off. Allegedly the fire spread from this backyard up the hillside.

    They are not telling the exact household or ignition source for good reason. People are angry, prepping pitchforks and torches.

    But there’s a lot of as-yet unfounded speculation about who and what. Did they leave a fire pit on? Did they toss a cigarette butt? Fireworks? I almost don’t want to know.

    3
  61. gVOR10 Avatar
    gVOR10

    @Andy: CONGRATULATIONS. You’ve joined my “Don’t Bother” list along with JKB, Fortune, and others.

    1
  62. Jay L Gischer Avatar
    Jay L Gischer

    @Andy: I said above that there’s always something someone could have done.

    That said, you seem to not notice that there’s an important context of calumny, false witness, and defamation around this. The political strategy employed by Trump is “make maximalist claims that sound ridiculous but get attention” and then when the (ahem) smoke clears, any fact at all that seems to corroborate is siezed on to say “See, I was RIGHT!!!”

    1
  63. Just nutha ignint cracker Avatar
    Just nutha ignint cracker

    @DK: I can only speak for my own grandfather who worked in the mines near Roslyn, WA, but I have on multiple source reports that he told my dad and my uncle that he didn’t care what they did for a living,* but if they went to work in the mines, he was disowning them.

    *One source includes “go be a gunsel for a gang” as one of the options. Felt really strong about the mines as a career, apparently. (And when my mom was emigrating to the US from Northern Ireland, my grandfather’s support guarantee listed his income as ~$130/week. For contrast, my dad’s listed ~$35/week.)

  64. Steven L. Taylor Avatar
    Steven L. Taylor

    @Chip Daniels: I am not disagreeing with you.

  65. Just nutha ignint cracker Avatar
    Just nutha ignint cracker

    @wr:

    All you people who have suddenly become experts on California, water and fires, could you just shut the fuck up for a couple of days while we deal with our grief over loved ones who have lost everything and the loss of some of the most beautiful communities in the country? There will plenty of time for ignorant yapping in a week or so.

    You’re asking this of people who, right at this moment, are participating in an extended argument about singing Imagine at Jimmy Carter’s funeral? Really???

    2
  66. DK Avatar
    DK

    @Just nutha ignint cracker:

    but if they went to work in the mines, he was disowning them.

    Hahahaha.

    What year was this king born?

  67. Just nutha ignint cracker Avatar
    Just nutha ignint cracker

    @Michael Reynolds: By building it outside of wildfire and earthquake zones–which, as the experience of the past week has demonstrated spectacularly, is way easier to blather about than to do.

    2
  68. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Andy: “My point is that we don’t know what those justified criticisms are yet but there will likely be some”

    Great. And at that time, you should really chime in and offer your opinion. Right now, lecturing everybody because at some point people will know something is really obnoxious and arrogant.

    You are not the only person who recognizes that it’s bad that a fire wipes out tens of thousands of houses. You really don’t need to tell us.

    1
  69. Just nutha ignint cracker Avatar
    Just nutha ignint cracker

    @DK: My dad was the firstborn of the family in 1919, so I’m guessing that my grandfather was born in the 1890s. The story is that he and two or three brothers or cousins (never been clear on the details) left Tuscany because he didn’t like farming.

    1
  70. dazedandconfused Avatar
    dazedandconfused

    @Chip Daniels:

    A fire outside the house will run out of fuel long before it heats the interior to that point.

    Had a conversation with a guy we sometimes do business with today, Lance Stretch. He related the story of how his house in the the fire-prone scrublands of Utah was the first to be built in that state which is considered fire-resistant to the point of being fire-proof to range fires. Says it only added about 13% to the total cost of having it built.

    Here’s a link to the materials. I think this company will be doing well in the near future:

    https://clearcreeksiding.com/?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiAp4O8BhAkEiwAqv2UqKtTg45awC2K4KaSfPx7_Si0oaA6T6OlKftV7h7iD05asUzMTGnTNhoCB-wQAvD_BwE

    1
  71. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Andy: “I think what’s necessary here is intellectual humility, not the kind of partisan combat that you and others endlessly want to engage in.”

    I don’t want partisan combat. I want some fucking respect — or at least a little compassion — for the victims instead of endless bloviating.

    Of course this is the internet…

    1
  72. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Just nutha ignint cracker: “You’re asking this of people who, right at this moment, are participating in an extended argument about singing Imagine at Jimmy Carter’s funeral? Really???”

    To be fair to Andy, I don’t think he’s participating in that. Seems a little beneath him.

  73. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    @DK:

    Your facts were not far off. Allegedly the fire spread from this backyard up the hillside.

    They are not telling the exact household or ignition source for good reason. People are angry, prepping pitchforks and torches.

    But there’s a lot of as-yet unfounded speculation about who and what. Did they leave a fire pit on? Did they toss a cigarette butt? Fireworks? I almost don’t want to know.

    That makes a lot of sense. The Marshall fire here in Colorado a couple of years ago had very similar dynamics – and was also very similar in terms of the fire itself (driven by high winds, extremely destructive, a dry climate during a drought phase, occurred on/near the wildland/urban interface, etc.)

    @gVOR10:

    CONGRATULATIONS. You’ve joined my “Don’t Bother” list along with JKB, Fortune, and others.

    I guess I should reciprocate then? It would be interesting to understand what, exactly, drove you to this decision. In my view, “waiting for all the facts” shouldn’t be that controversial, but opinions vary.

    @Jay L Gischer:

    That said, you seem to not notice that there’s an important context of calumny, false witness, and defamation around this. The political strategy employed by Trump is “make maximalist claims that sound ridiculous but get attention” and then when the (ahem) smoke clears, any fact at all that seems to corroborate is siezed on to say “See, I was RIGHT!!!”

    I’m quite aware of that fact. I just don’t see much use in signal boosting it. And if you’ve read the thread carefully, you’d note that I do not take the claims being made by the people you’re talking about at face value, but neither do I dismiss them out of hand. As noted many times, I think we must wait for all the facts and a full assessment.

    @wr:

    Great. And at that time, you should really chime in and offer your opinion. Right now, lecturing everybody because at some point people will know something is really obnoxious and arrogant.

    You are not the only person who recognizes that it’s bad that a fire wipes out tens of thousands of houses. You really don’t need to tell us.

    I’m not lecturing people. Here’s the first comment I made which caused people to blow up in disagreement for some reason:

    We’ll have to wait for the after-action-reports, but in general, the conditions that led to these fires have long been known features of the area. It’s not as if this kind of event was unpredictable or unpredicted except in regard to the specific timing. If it’s actually the case that “nothing” could have been done, then that bodes ill for the other similarly vulnerable areas that have been spared this time around.

    That is my opinion at this point in time, and it remains so.

    Apparently to people like you, that’s lecturing and beyond the pale. Again, I cannot read your mind, but you consistently do not act in a way that is at all tolerant of any disagreement, and you continually insist on characterizing those you disagree with by impugning and presuming their motives. You seem incapable of actual disagreement, or even the simple idea of “agree to disagree.” Even for something which should not be that controversial like, “hey, let’s wait until all the facts are in before making definitive judgments.” It would be much more useful if you could simply explain what you disagree with and why – but no – for whatever reasons you choose not to do that. It’s tiresome.

    I don’t want partisan combat. I want some fucking respect — or at least a little compassion — for the victims instead of endless bloviating.

    You’ll get respect from me once you stop acting like an asshole in your disagreements with me and impugning and presuming my motives in lieu of an actual point. Note that I don’t reciprocate and accuse you of being motivated by character flaws, or ignore the substance of points you make to attack you for “lecturing,” being motivated by moral superiority, or whatever. I don’t presume to know what’s in your head and all I can go on is what you write here, which is consistently unfriendly in a douchey and unproductive way. It would be interesting to have a real debate/discussion with you, but you always start off with the ad hominems which make that problematic.

    As for the victims, you’ve said jack shit about them in regards to compassion in this thread. All you’ve done in this thread is whine about what other people are saying that you don’t like, which is – in my view – 90% of your overall participation in OTB comments. Maybe you ought to start modeling the behavior you want to see in others if you want some respect.

    3
  74. Connor Avatar
    Connor

    https://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/historical-atlantic-hurricane-and-tropical-storm-records/

    A comment on natural disaster frequency:

    There are any number of studies out there. Many fraudulent. The link here is a reasonable one.
    I have seen others. The essential point is that serious studies not having an ax to grind find no statistically significant increase in frequency or intensity for hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, wild fires and floods. (Oddly, the one that had a trend was wildfires, but it was down. But not statistically significant, so you have to say flat.) Some of the fraudsters tricks:

    – when measuring temperature increase climatologists love to pick 1850. “The dawn of the industrial age.” But not the hurricane alarmists. It is a documented fact that there can be 1-2 decade long trends up or down. The fraudsters like to pick 1960 or 1970 because there’s a recent uptrend. But look at a century and it disappears.

    – measuring by dollar. Of course the intensity goes up in dollars. Replacement costs rise and shoreline population intensity increases.

    – the fraudster world of data “adjustment factors.”

    No doubt, the data is noisy. But this notion of climate change as causing more natural disasters just doesn’t hold up except in studies where the conclusion was determined at the outset, not the end.

    Just one other observation. Those poo-pooing the notion of clearing out brush in neighborhoods are, I think, making a straw man argument. I think the notion is a brush clearing/fire wall concept outside/surrounding the neighborhoods. Now that said, I don’t live there so maybe that’s a pipe dream. Lastly, I have no idea what policy mistakes have been made, or if any realistic actions could have been taken to prevent this. Drought and wind isn’t a good mix. There will be time for that stuff later.

    But a brain teaser for people is what to do about insurance. Its not as easy as one might think.

  75. Michael Reynolds Avatar
    Michael Reynolds

    I realize this is rich coming from me, but we might be getting a little over the top with @Andy. People are upset, as we should be. But I don’t think Andy set the fires.

    This is a very heavy blow to LA, and the state of California, and obviously above all to the people running for their lives down paved streets through burning residential areas far from forests. And boy Hollywood did not need this. Every Californian is at least somewhat prepared mentally for earthquakes, sanguine even. But in a modern city, in modern times, in a world where we don’t light rooms with candles or cook over open fire, we were not prepared for a replay of the Great Fire of London.

    Massive rebuilding for years. I wonder who we’ll get to build those homes.

    6
  76. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @dazedandconfused:

    A fire outside the house will run out of fuel long before it heats the interior to that point.

    That’s entirely dependent on how much fuel we are talking about, how its is being consumed, how strong the winds are, etc.

    I’ve personally witnessed a fire from a half framed apartment building shatter the windows and ignite furniture 30 feet away, just from radiant heat.
    Again, this wasn’t just a brushfire, it was a firestorm, which behaves very differently.

    6
  77. Just nutha ignint cracker Avatar
    Just nutha ignint cracker

    Just when you think there’s nothing stupider left to say, Elon Musk strikes again. 🙁

    Instead of mourning the devastating destruction and death that’s befallen the city of Los Angeles due to raging wildfires this week, Elon Musk has taken to his far-right hate speech incubator X to blame the fires on — wait for it — diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs.

    In other words, Musk is using unabashedly racist lies to pin the climate change-fueled disaster on minorities.

    “They prioritized DEI over saving lives and homes,” Musk tweeted. He was responding to a post by the anti-LGBTQ+ hate account Libs of TikTok, which claimed that the LA Fire Department ensured its employees were “racially diverse enough” — something that was then contorted into racist vitriol in Musk’s twisted mind.

  78. Chip Daniels Avatar
    Chip Daniels

    @Just nutha ignint cracker:

    DEI/ Woke just means “Not Having A White Man In Charge”.

    And that breaks their brains.

    7
  79. dazedandconfused Avatar
    dazedandconfused

    @Chip Daniels: True, a fire-storm is a different animal. Only extreme construction practices have any shot at standing up to one of those.

  80. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    @Michael Reynolds:

    Rents are already very high on Los Angeles basin rentals, and vacancy rates low. A lot of people will be having a real hard time finding where to live.

  81. restless Avatar
    restless

    @Connor:

    Reading the article, they seem to be just looking at frequency. And it does seem that you can’t really see any major increase in frequency of hurricanes.

    This article though

    https://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/global-warming-and-hurricanes/

    Talks about intensity of storms and rainfall as related to human caused global temperature increases. Here, they do find a link.

    It may well be that storms are more intense, though not more frequent. As far as insurance is concerned, every year there are more people at risk, and more structures to damage, increasing the cost of insurance payout.

    As someone up above mentioned, the gold standard for making policy used be the “hundred year event “. As the events become more intense, that 100 year event becomes a 50 year event or even a 20 year event.

    Drought and Santa Ana winds are weather events, and will become more intense, just like hurricanes and rain storms.

    Mitigating against these events costs money – either taxes for infrastructure or meeting policy driven regulations. Who will pay to clear brush? Who will pay to create more robust water delivery infrastructure?

    3
  82. DrDaveT Avatar
    DrDaveT

    @JKB:

    Controlled burns to remove forest floor detritus and low brush has along scientific history and was even used by native tribes in North America in the 17th century.

    In urban areas? “You amaze me, Jack.”

    3
  83. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @Michael Reynolds: For some reason, I suspect that people who can afford million-plus dollar homes will struggle with the hardships of getting homes rebuilt considerably less than ordinary mortals.

    2
  84. Eusebio Avatar
    Eusebio

    The sad truth is that drought conditions and vicious dry winds were a sufficient catalyst.

    It’s not much more complicated than this statement in the OP. Dry winds of 60-80 mph, gusting to 100 mph, on top of a months-long drought were enough to create expectations for potentially catastrophic wildfires. Once a fire is started on parched land–from power lines, vehicles, or some kind of carelessness–it’s not hard to understand that containment could be impossible under 60+ mph dry winds, regardless of landscaping and home construction decisions.
    But the destruction can always be mitigated, and based on reports of fire officials saying they need more firefighters and more equipment, I suspect that questions are being/will be asked on what could have been done to bring in more personnel and equipment from out of the region sooner; i.e., based on the weather forecasts, could far more firefighting support, including not only fire personnel and apparatus but also fleets of water tankers, have been traveling to SoCal on Monday and Tuesday?
    And in the near future, factors such as vegetation management, municipal water capacity design, and fire-resistant construction codes (reported as having been implemented a few years ago in some communities) will no doubt be scrutinized.

    2
  85. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    @just nutha:

    million-plus dollar homes

    In Altadena, that would describe very modest little ranch houses.

    ETA: OTOH, a large part of that is just the value of the lot.

    4
  86. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @charontwo: Okay, given that no ordinary mortals are left, in SoCal, I’ll hope for an even distribution of misery and hardship. Suit you better?

    1
  87. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    @just nutha:

    that no ordinary mortals are left,

    My brother, a lifelong school teacher, retired 3 years ago and sold his South Pasadena house for $1.5 M. (Bought in 1975 for $35 K.).

    People living in red states have no idea what houses cost in places like Altadena and Brooklyn, NYC.

    2
  88. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Eusebio: “I suspect that questions are being/will be asked on what could have been done”

    Gavin Newsom has already ordered an investigation — not to find blame (because he’s not a Republican) but to understand what went wrong in order to do things better next time.

    2
  89. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Michael Reynolds: “I realize this is rich coming from me, but we might be getting a little over the top with @Andy.”

    Yeah, you’re right. I’m angry and heartbroken, and when he posted what felt like incredibly insensitive messages on the subject I took it out on him.

    My apologies to Andy and to the community here.

    2
  90. wr Avatar
    wr

    @Michael Reynolds: “Massive rebuilding for years. I wonder who we’ll get to build those homes.”

    I could see this being a great boon to the area — massive amounts of new construction jobs, creating a new middle class.

    But there are a couple of big problems in the way — there’s already a huge shortage of construction workers in SoCal (without even bringing up the forthcoming deportation regime), and even if we could find the workers, where would they live while they’re building?

    2
  91. wr Avatar
    wr

    @just nutha: “For some reason, I suspect that people who can afford million-plus dollar homes will struggle with the hardships of getting homes rebuilt considerably less than ordinary mortals.”

    The average home price in Los Angeles County is right around $900,000. When you snark about fat cats with million-dollar homes, you’re really talking about almost half the home owners in the county.

    2
  92. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    @wr:

    Altadena is:

    A) In the foothills (desirable)

    B) Fairly close to downtown LA, also JPL (desirable)

    I. e., a fairly upscale bit of suburbia.

  93. wr Avatar
    wr

    @charontwo: Sure, Altadena is lovely. Looked at some places there, but my wife was concerned that since it was technically unincorporated LA county, law enforcement is provided by the notoriously corrupt and incompetent sheriff’s department. So we stayed in Pasadena.

    But if your point is “Altadena is lovely, so it’s really an expensive place for rich people,” that’s simply not true. Just in terms of entertainment biz folk in the SG valley, writers, producers actors and directors live in Pasadena; grips and wardrobe and make-up and hair live in Altadena. There are (or were) some fabulous old mansions, but most it’s working middle-class.

    I don’t want to misread you, but what I’m getting is that people in Altadena are rich because they live in a nice neighborhood and can afford a decent house. For most of the last century, that was the definition of middle class.

    2
  94. charontwo Avatar
    charontwo

    Housing prices in California have escalated rapidly in the last few decades. Those middle class people in Altadena can afford to live there because they bought years ago, and Proposition 13 is grandfathering them on affordable property taxes.

    Yesterday I posted a google maps link to my old house in Arcadia, across the street from Sierra Madre. I have been away from California way too long to be able to afford that house now.

    And yes, I already know the population of Altadena is largely middle class, my point was how expensive CA is for middle class people.

  95. just nutha Avatar
    just nutha

    @wr: As I noted in my correction, I’ll hope for equal frustration and despair for everyone, then. It’s the best I can do. (Beyond noting that there’s a significant difference between being able to buy a million dollar home and having inflation revalue your home to $1,000,000 over the course of a lifetime.)

  96. Andy Avatar
    Andy

    It was a busy weekend, and I’m late coming back to this thread. I just wanted to say I appreciate what wr and Michael said and no hard feelings on my end. This is a historic and terrible situation, and for my part, I know that wr and others live in the area and are experiencing this, so I should have been more cognizant of that fact in at least the tone of my comments.

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