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Post by xtra on Feb 14, 2009 12:29:22 GMT -6
Did the Fire have to happen? Do fires like the one in Australia that kill hundreds and cause millions in damages need to happen? If the government is supposed to protect us why havent they? www.brasschecktv.com/page/484.htmlFirefighter Blog: Where Is The Evergreen 747 Supertanker? tinyurl.com/dngydz
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Post by jeffolie on Feb 14, 2009 22:00:13 GMT -6
Arsonists siezed the opportunity provided by Mother Nature and human misjudgements. It happens often in California.
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Post by xtra on Feb 15, 2009 22:19:50 GMT -6
Arsonists siezed the opportunity provided by Mother Nature and human misjudgements. It happens often in California. hey jeffolie, what do you think about this (the links) Did the Fire have to happen? Do fires like the one in Australia that kill hundreds and cause millions in damages need to happen? If the government is supposed to protect us why havent they? www.brasschecktv.com/page/484.htmlFirefighter Blog: Where Is The Evergreen 747 Supertanker? tinyurl.com/dngydz
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Post by graybeard on Feb 15, 2009 23:52:31 GMT -6
Thanks for the link to the firefighter blog. It contains some rumors and inaccuracies, but is pretty good. Here's my take on the brasscheck: ---------- A special memory I have of a SoCalif wildfire goes all the way back to 1968, when a power line was blown down near Mount Laguna, east of San Diego, starting a Santana driven fire that roared nearly 50 miles to the outskirts of San Diego in just one night. Many other wildfires are started by illegal aliens' campfires in the mountainous canyons east of San Diego. The Santana (derived from Spanish "satan") winds, more commonly called Santa Ana Winds, are high winds caused by atmospheric highs over the Great Basin to the north. The air in the winds heats up and dries out as it goes downslope out of the mountains and into the SoCalif coastal areas. Hurricane-force winds are common, with horrific gusts on top of that. Five per cent humidity was recorded at March AFB last week, with many stations reporting less than 10%. If the vegetation isn't already tinder dry, it soon will be in those conditions. Until the devil's breath, Santana Winds are tamed, we will have wildfires, and they will burn completely out of control until the wind shifts after a few days. While Santanas' intensity and frequency may well be aggravated by climate change, there are news accounts of them going back at least to 1901. Look up Santana Wind on en.wikipedia.com . Airplanes, amazingly enough, fly through the air, subject to the whims of the winds. The higher the wind, and the more rugged the terrain, the greater the turbulence affecting the airplane. It is unsafe for firefighting planes to fly low in winds greater than 40 mph for that reason, regardless of size plane. And, guess what, when the wind is blowing hard, the water or retardant is scattered, making it useless. Lines of retardant render fuels nonflammable, and are dropped along the flanks of a fire, not into it. Dropping water or retardant right on a wind-driven fire of any size is a total waste. Flying embers can start fires up to a mile ahead of a fire, too. I appreciate the guy's frustration in that video on brasschecktv, but I see any shortcomings as normal government incompetence, rather than sinister scheming. That video is a wackjob of the first order. The 2007 fire in the background of that video started east of San Diego by a lost hunter shooting off a flare gun. I haven't heard what started the Sylmar fire on 14 Nov 08, but the Montecito fire started the day before from a campfire abandoned by college students who had not thoroughly quenched it. The Triangle Freeway fire started that same week in Corona, Calif, by a car's overheated catalytic converter. So much for anti-pollution devices. I'm glad we have them, but there's no free lunch. Sure, there are plenty of fires started by sickos, but they are not the only cause, and the govt sure doesn't need to do it. A thousand wildfires in Calif were started by lightning in June 2008. The Russians have an IL-76 that can drop 16,000 gallons of water. BFD. The MARS monster, one of a kind, was deployed from Vancouver, BC, to SoCalif in 2007, but the fires were mostly under control by the time it arrived. That one scoops up 20-30,000 gallons. The DC-10 shown in the video made about 80 drops of 12,000 gallons each of retardant on the fires north of Sacramento in June 2008. 12,000 gallons is 110,000 pounds, dropped in 8 seconds. That's equal to two fully loaded 18-wheelers. The second DC-10 is now ready, with a possible eventual fleet of five. A 747 supertanker that hauls 23,000 gallons of retardant is nearly ready, too, but has had some design challenges. The IL-76 tanker, btw, is not certified for flight into the US, and it wouldn't be a good idea to deploy it here, for various reasons. The DC-10 tanker was developed from a great idea, with $15 million in private investment, and no govt money. The USFS and BLM bureaucracies could not agree on a contract for it, so in May 2007, the Governator issued an executive order for a $5 Million per year, 3 year contract to test the feasibility. It appears to have been a great investment. The second DC-10 is now available to the state on an as needed basis, and is ready and waiting for deployment to Australia. Of course, their govt budget problems are even worse than ours.
President Obama will hopefully restore competent leaders to federal agencies. GB
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Post by xtra on Feb 16, 2009 22:19:52 GMT -6
well I live in an area that had 3 of the biggest fires in this country and 1 took over a dozen firefighers lives in the last 25 years. both fires, 12+years apart hit my house. and these planes that can do what they do, could have put them out in a day (yes at a million a day) but they never came. fuck you momma government go take your Mars missions and wars for empire that kill over a million innocent people and shove em up your ass. Fuck You Government
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Post by graybeard on Feb 17, 2009 6:26:40 GMT -6
In keeping with your libertarian ideals, why should the govt spend money fighting fires to protect private land?
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Post by xtra on Feb 17, 2009 12:49:07 GMT -6
In keeping with your libertarian ideals, why should the govt spend money fighting fires to protect private land? who ever said I was a Lib? In fact Im against "labeling" and piegon holing people. The fact of the matter is that if that plane had been used at a million bucks it would have saved 14 firefighters lives and probably 5 times more in damage than it costs to put it out. Since this criminal government steals 60%+ of our money through taxes, then they have an obligation to do certain things...and putting out fires should be higher on the list than trips to mars and bridges to nowhere.
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Post by graybeard on Feb 17, 2009 17:59:25 GMT -6
Are you referring to the fire in Colo a few years ago? What were the winds at the time?
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