Paradise lost
The name of the northern California Sierra foothill town of Paradise is evocative. Paradise! A place you might want to go. A place you might even want to live.
But reports are that the town of 27,000 is no more, that it has been destroyed by an unusually fast-moving fire (even by California standards) fanned by high winds and drought conditions. The town had been evacuated yesterday morning and afternoon, but it’s very possible that some people didn’t get out: the elderly and/or disabled, and those who just left too late or were stopped by fires started by wind-blown embers, clogged roads, and poor visibility.
Here’s a video that shows you what they faced, taken by some residents fleeing in a car:
Authorities can’t give any figures yet on number of buildings destroyed or lives lost. The first number is probably more or less the entire town, and the second number completely unknown. I just saw this article which says that five people have been found dead in their cars in one area of town, where gridlock allowed the flames to overtake them as they attempted to flee. But there’s no reason to believe there aren’t many more dead people in town.
One person who managed to escape is American Digest blogger (and sometime-commenter here) Gerard Vanderleun, who has lived in Paradise for several years and who left as soon as he realized the town was threatened. He’s in nearby Chico, which is safe so far. But he’s been informed that he’s lost his home and everything in it. [NOTE ADDED: This is the “donate” button at his blog, if you care to contribute.]
I think at this point all you can do is pray for the town, the dead, the survivors, and the firefighters and police and everyone involved in rescue and relief efforts.
[NOTE: Here’s an article on why fires in California seem to be getting worse.]
[ADDENDUM: There’s another must-watch video here, showing the situation and the panic of some other drivers. I can’t seem to embed it, so you have to go to the site to watch it.]
Yeah… quite some fire. The smoke is thick here in the Bay Area, a long way from the actual fire.
Waiting to hear from, or of, a friend who, last I heard, lived in Paradise. I hope she and her dog got out OK.
It’s original spelling was “Pair-‘O-Dice” — no, I’m not kidding.
There were mining camps all around the place.
&&&
The other ‘funny’ California place-name: Coalinga.
It’s original spelling was: Coaling ‘A’ — yeah, it was a pit stop for the rail road.
Today, everyone uses: Co-a-lin-ga as its pronounciation. Heh.
Yes…prayers for all those affected.
Thank God they made it out. Now we need to pray that all others also escape, and pray for them in the future as they rebuild their lives.
Those who don’t believe prayers help should take a look at this. They will scoff, but we know the Truth.
It’s a terrible thing to see.
Malibu residents have been ordered to leave given an approaching fire. We are supposed to attend a great neice’s Bat Mitzvah at a Malibu venue in December. I hope this beautiful area is spared nature’s wrath.
My wife tells me that there are now 18 fires in California. Seems to happen every time we have Santa Ana winds. She also heard a report that there were no resources to fight some of them. Of course there are resources to pour into the misguided “bullet train to nowhere” project, and to provide sanctuary and welfare to anyone who crosses the border.
A few weeks ago Pac Gas & Electric shut down power to my daughter, and many others, because of winds. Seems they have been blamed for some of the really bad fires as a result of falling power lines. Oddly, my rural electric Coop in Virginia seldom had trouble with winds, snow or ice. They did a lot of preventive maintenance to clear over hanging branches and such.
My daughter keeps a three horse trailer hooked up all through fire season so that she can evacuate her considerable animal population in one quick trip if need be.
I don’t know whether natural or man-made (political) disasters are the biggest threat in this state.. I do know that I would rather take my chances on the natural.
I use to live near Kings Canyon. The natural beauty of the area and the nice folks who are from that part of California will always live in my heart.
Maybe I’m a bad person, but I’m not feeling sympathy for Malibu.
started by a campfire…
i wonder if it was a family of four out on a picnic..
or some other kind of campfire..
sad…
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but arent these people helping elections in Venezuela
convincing people here to vote for migrations not invasions
and whatever..
however usually they think they are insulated
till suddenly, they find they are not as much insulated as they thought.
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sad that i know some of the people there..
through my photo work…
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note that these same people prevent burn offs, fire breaks, and all manner of things like water…
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On another note, can someone ask Bernie some questions and get that dumbass off the stage and perhaps get his followers to show how far they be played by this crap? i even supply the information that every person black or white who attended school should know as a basic history of our government if not the nation…
Bernie Sanders: White Voters Are ‘Uncomfortable’ Voting for Blacks
Native Californian Victor Davis Hanson has another perspective to offer: Christmas Lessons from California
There are other factors at play in California’s semi-self-imposed disasters.
My relatives in Thousand Oaks have had quite a week. First, they were three miles from the Borderline shooting. Now they’re three miles from the fire lines, and watching closely. With reference to not feeling sorry for Malibu: My niece reports that a friend between her and Malibu has had to evacuate. There are lots of ordinary folk before one gets to the exclusive enclaves right on the coast.
For all its initial promise, it’s natural riches, glorious scenery, and generally sunny and wonderful climate, “Golden State” California is just subject to too many natural disasters for my taste—from earthquakes to wildfires, and mudslides.
Making things a lot worse are their man-made disasters—the largest illegal alien population of any state, which costs California taxpayers an estimated $30 billion plus dollars per year—and which consumes very close to 18% of the entire state’s annual budget, serial killers, crazy, sky high taxes and housing prices on the coast, depressed ares in the interior, crumbling infrastructure, close to the worse school system in the nation, vast over regulation of just about practically everything, out of control, gigantic, un-payable government pension debt, and wild government spending, on things like California’s one billion dollar, never finished, high speed rail line between San Francisco and LA., homeless encampments and vagrants everywhere, and, now, San Francisco’s self-inflicted junky needle and Poopicide epidemic, which is forcing high tech Silicon Valley workers to run a gantlet of junkies infesting BART to get to work each day,** and San Francisco residents to very carefully watch their steps.
No wonder that the yearly reported outflow of people leaving the state that “You Haul” compiles is higher than the inflow, for an ever increasing annual net loss of population.
** See, for instance, here at: https://meaww.com/san-francisco-bart-open-drug-abuse-opioid-crisis-daily-commuters-rush-hour-vomit-police-corridor-civic-center-station-personnel
See also this story about San Francisco’s new “Snapcrap” ap for people to use to report street piles of poop to the city, so the they can send out city workers to clean it up. See https://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/article219467495.html
Then, not to be missed, is the “poop map“ of downtown San Francisco that alerts residents and visitors to the higher poop level areas in the city so the they can avoid them. See https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/human-wasteland-map-plots-all-of-san-franciscos-poop
In addition, there was the recent outbreak of Typhus among street people in downtown LA. See https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/california/Public-Health-Reports-Several-Cases-of-Typhus-495197621.html
Finally, see this recent story about how a major medical convention, which has routinely met in San Francisco for many years, has pulled out of it’s annual booking in San Francisco because of concerns about the conditions on the streets there. See https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Dirty-Streets-Threaten-San-Francisco-Convention-Industry-487266591.html
Not good folks.
Thousand Oaks, the site of the country music bar shooting, is close to Malibu and the wildfires. Many Californians must feel overwhelmed by this confluence of terrible recent events. It’s an area that’s rich in terms of monetary wealth and natural beauty, but obviously tragedy can happen anywhere. My heart goes out to everyone affected.
I had no idea things were so dire. My family and I will pray for them, the lost especially. A horrific way to die.
I thank God Vanderleun is alright and out of the way for now. I’ve always enjoyed and appreciated his writings.
I am seeing word on FB that a second-hand acquaintance has lost their home and livestock due to the fire. Horrible, Thoughts to all affected.
California when not quaking, burning in a drought, mudsliding in a monsoon is a beautiful state from north to south. But I wouldn’t want to live there, particularly because the loons of the left have hijacked the state, and because I like the quiet nature of my flyover home.
Stay as safe as possible Californians. If you are able, move to Texas or Arizona to prevent those states turning ‘blue’.
My wife and I inherited a house in Paradise. Beautiful little city. We live 850 miles away and decided that it was too far to travel for a weekend or offer it for rental in the Democratic Peoples Republic of California, so we put it on the market in 2015 and it sold. The secondary consideration for selling it is that it was a tinderbox area. It now appear that house is ashes.
What’s causing some of these uncontrollable fires in CA lays at the feet of the wacko environmentalists. Property owners and cities used to “Cut” firebreaks to prevent the wide spread fires all over the state. Environmentalists stopped that since it might injure the habitat of the Central American dust mite, or whatever de jure critter was on their list at the time…….and it didn’t look very pretty. Funny but the Fire Departments battling the blaze burned areas to act as a fire break to stop the flames, but they couldn’t bulldoze a fire line as a preventive measure. Due to (insert “F” word here) stupidity an entire town has been lost.
Morons….abject morons
I’ve been watching more European TV this evening. Theresa May and Macron laid wreaths in France to mark the end of the Great War. Today was also the eightieth anniversary of Krystallnacht and the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
My thoughts and prayers go out to those who suffered from the California fires. The state needs to find some ways to mitigate this problem.
I spent Remembrance Day in Westminster Abbey about ten years ago when I was invited to sit with the Royal Army Medical Corps. We sat in front of the RAMC window in the Abbey. The Queen laid the wreath on the Cenotaph outside while we sat.
I called my son the firefighter and he is, thank God, sitting in the station watching the fires on TV.
Bkhuna, not surprised that you found the people in Kings Canyon charming. I just reviewed the election map from Tuesday, and sure enough; the preponderance of the state–geographically–is Red. Same old, same old. The huge populations of the coastal, leftist enclaves overwhelm the rural areas and small towns with whom they have so little in common. (California once again voted backwards on nearly every state-wide proposition; including continuing the despicable gas tax.)
Aforementioned daughter lives in El Dorado County, Sierra foothills. The place bears little resemblance to Sacramento some fifty miles away; and is in a different universe from SF, etc.
As for Malibu, the beautiful people may not notice if their second or third homes are destroyed; but, there are plenty of others in the area; and I feel for them. Again, daughter lost her home in a mud slide in 2010. No one noticed and no agency had anything to offer because it was an isolated event with no political fall-out. Insurance naturally classified it as a flood–no flood insurance. Just pick up the pieces the best you can and move on. (If you are going to be part of a disaster, be sure that it is a huge one that attracts political and media notice.)
Cannot imagine the grief, the suffering, and the anxiety associated with these fires. God bless and sustain the suffering.
In my bleakest imaginings, I see fire being a large part of our next civil war.
I have …now had …a client office in Paradise Pines (a little to the north of Paradise proper).
They went dark on my remote connections list yesterday (Thu) morning. I called. Then emailed. Nothing.
I spoke with the site manager this afternoon (it’s been crazy times for him): the community is just …gone. They are/were in the forested area.
Ponderosa pines burn quick and hot. The terrain can be steep. The egress roads are …few. (Only two main egress roads in the southwest area. And one of those is steep and curvy and forest lined: we’ve driven it many times.) I’m guessing the video was the larger road – Skyway Rd – that goes straight into Chico down Butte Creek Canyon (driven that many times too).
He said all staff seem to have managed to evacuate in time. Though barely in some cases (shirt on their back stuff, and little-to-nothing else). But their homes, and their way of life, are just …gone. Smoke and embers and ashes. He’s really worried: they managed some 3500 properties in the HOA there (the office was a casualty, too).
The thing is, the whole area is primarily a retirement community; lots of old/elderly people. Some past the age of driving or owning cars. He – no one – has any idea how many people made it out. That fire moved fast. He is really worried. Bordering on shock, from our conversation.
Prayer is all that’s left.
With this amount of devastation, it will be decades, if ever, before the area is rebuilt. The town is a total loss. And who would want to retire there now.
…it’s overwhelming.
Leave it to the ultraliberal BBC to completely miss one of the key missing parts of the equation, probably THE biggest:
Cali has a zero tolerance policy for controlled burns. And it suppresses all natural burns. So the debris builds up and builds up until it’s so deep and such complete TINDER it only takes a light spark, a loose cinder, or a whiff of lightning to ignite it. What’s worst is these fires are so hot and so lasting that they sterilize the soil, killing all the life there, so it takes far longer for the natural groundcover to re-assert itself, meaning more erosion and more runoff of the natural soil into the streams, lakes, and aquifers.
Cali deserves to burn.
Sorry, Gerard. You should have left Cali two decades ago. Do it now. Get out while the time is right for you. This is God saying “GETTTT OUTTTTT!!!”
I **AM** truly sorry for your loss, it’s tragic to lose everything but your life. But Cali’s state government is filled with madmen, from the Forest Service to the Pension runners and everything in between. You could not pay me enough to live in Cali.
When even MOTHER JONES knows what the f*** the solution is…
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/12/a-century-of-fire-suppression-is-why-california-is-in-flames/
FORBES is also on the case:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckdevore/2018/07/30/californias-devastating-fires-are-man-caused-but-not-in-the-way-they-tell-us/#73cc6a7470af
This is not going to get better. It’s not. Not until someone shoots the entire legislature and half the idiots who keep voting for them.
It seems this fire didn’t burn the trees. Like in this first video of the car leaving just the forest floor was burning. Could be because the stronger winds and how fast it moved.
I grew up in So-Cal, and my parents loved living out in the hills – but it meant that we lived with the possibility and dangers of brush fires every late summer and fall.
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/57749.html
“Fire governs the wilderness. Certain of the native plant seeds do not even properly germinate until heated to so-many degrees. The plants themselves are resinous and burn readily, when the hot wind desert wind blows. This I knew, early on. The standing old-growth forests, and even the newer pine-woods other parts of California and the west – they are governed, bound, ruthlessly maintained by cycles of naturally-occurring fire and renewal. Fire thins the new seedlings, eliminates disease-weakened trees, clears away the mast and muddle – the broom that ruthlessly sweeps away, and renews. This my father taught us. A lesson which certain environmental groups seem to refuse, with the energy of a small child refusing a spoonful of delicious creamed spinach. No! Don’t cut down those pine-bark-infested pine trees! No, don’t clear-cut that brush! It’s icky interference with nature! And don’t do controlled burns, which endanger the spotted lizard-owl something! So the burnable load increases, increases and increases again, and when it finally all goes up, it burns so hot that the earth turns clean and barren, like a kiln transforming clay into pottery. Nature deferred will extract her penalty.”
With this amount of devastation, it will be decades, if ever, before the area is rebuilt. The town is a total loss. And who would want to retire there now.
After the Bel Air fire in 1961, in an affluent part of Los Angeles, there were vacant lots ten years and even 20 years later.
The insane environmental rules contribute as there are no fire breaks or controlled burns. There is no logging, not even of dead trees. I lived in Lake Arrowhead for a while ten years ago. The density of pine trees was far beyond the water sources to keep them alive in dry years. As a result there was an infestation of bark beetles which finished the job of killing the trees. Then the dead trees stood there with logging banned.
Meanwhile, California has an explosion of “homeless,” many of them illegal aliens. They camp in dry canyons and cook their food over campfires. The Camp fire may have been caused by one such illegal camp fire. There was one in west Los Angeles several years ago, before I moved to Arizona, that was caused by an illegal camp fire in dry brush near the 405 freeway.
There are no new reservoirs and the infrastructure supports twice the population of 30 years ago when the last such projects were built. The VD Hanson piece notes that 2016 was a wet year but no new reservoirs were there to collect the water for dry years.
I lived in California for 60 years and my wife is third generation but we got out two years ago.
OBloodyHell:
Actually, California does not have zero tolerance for controlled burns, but it could indeed use more of them. I’m planning to publish a piece on this today.
By the way, you suggest that Gerard should have left California two decades ago. You’re probably not aware that he’s only very recently moved back there in order to assist his extremely elderly mother who still lives there. He’s lived most of his life in other places, actually. He’s written about this on his blog.
American Digest has been one of my favorite blogs for 15 years and Gerard feels like a personal friend even though we’ve never met.
Hitting the tip jar today.
I can only watch these videos because I know — by mere virtue of the fact that I’m watching the video — that the person escaped. The Gatlinburg fire was the first time is ever seen videos like that.
When I lived in the Bay Area, (in a potential fire area), during fire season, I’d bring my irreplaceable items to my office (massive concrete structure) and keep a bags of basic evacuation items: one at home, one in my car, and one in my office. (Change of clothes, tooth brush, tooth paste, hand wipes, copies of important stuff, flash drive with additional important stuff. Now, you can’t keep it in your car because it will probably get stolen.)
I worried about my cat and dog and what would happen if I wasn’t home to get them out when a fire raged. (I had the stickers on the door but if no one is there to help them… And notice I wore “when” not “if.” You live there, you expect that some day… And pray it never happens.)
I first moved back to California as an adult right before the Berkely Hills fire. I’d rented a room from someone in an apartment complex that went up. Luckily, I hadn’t moved in yet. I also lucked out in getting a studio apartment the next day, before gouging rents started. I remember bits and pieces of singed paper floating onto the roof of my friends building over by Park Blvd. I specifically remember two pieces: one from a cook book, and one handwritten — maybe a note, maybe a journal. It was so sad…
One city in Marin had an idiotic ordinance that prevented building on top of hills. The outcome of that was that there’d be a hill of dry tinder in the middle of housing. Perfect for catching on fire and spreading to people’s homes. If they could be built on, they’d have a nice manicured lawns, and be watered, reducing fire risk. The jacka$$ who pushed for it was very proud of himself.
It’s a major stroke of luck that no fire had spread too much because of this. But I think it’s just a matter of time.
California is a wonderful place with too many idiots at the helm. I sometimes wish I still lived there, but I’m glad I moved.
There was a fire in Bel Air near the 405 just last year, when the big Ventura County fire was burning, caused by a homeless camp.
My grandparents, great-grandparents, and great-great-grandparents are buried in San Gabriel. My grandmother and father told me how beautiful southern California was before WWII. Along with Victor Davis Hanson, I mourn the loss of the California that was.
“Nature deferred will extract her penalty.” – Sgt. Mom
And the bill is usually presented by the Gods of the Copy-book Headings.
PS to Gerard: glad you made it out. I was scanning through the comments on your blog and it is so wonderful to see the outpouring of love and support from the friends you have made on-line through the years. The great promise of the internet does reach its potential in some places!
One of them said this:
“National forests need to be cut and managed and when we don’t steward these lands properly, this is what happens and keeps happening. These big fires have carbon footprint that no laws can touch.”
So true, and so typical of the environmentalists who see only a small part of the ecosystem and don’t evaluate the full effects of their manipulations, here and in other ways.
One might say they just can’t see the forest for the trees — and now there are no trees either.
My wife & I live hundreds of miles from any of the fires. I spent most of yesterday outdoors enjoying the excellent weather. When I went to bed a bit early last night, I moved from downstairs where the windows were closed to upstairs where the windows are all open.
Bam, the room had a strong odor of smoke, and worse yet the odor had burnt plastics and rubber components. I ran outside to check the skyline, as our community is heavily wooded. I don’t ever recall smoke carrying that far in the past.
This closely mirrors my history, actually. I was born in Cali’ (second gen) – about 45 miles south of the fire area, actually …in Marysville …which is one reason I’ve clients in the area – and lived in Cali’ until I was 60, too. We left 6 years ago (I usually say “escaped”) though.
OBloodyHell,
Gerald can’t leave California even if he wanted to. His mom lives there. She’s 104. He’s staying with her right now.
Neo,
I don’t know if you can, but I believe someone must start a GoFundMe page for Gerald.
theduchessofkitty:
This is the “donate” button at his blog, and I assume that will have the same effect.
Update to my first comment: my friend just checked in; she and her dog are safe at her brother’s place in Reno, having made an expeditious exit and thus beaten the traffic and chaos.
Update at Gerard’s blog:
http://americandigest.org/wp/ashes-ashes-we-all-fall-down/
By the way, you suggest that Gerard should have left California two decades ago. You’re probably not aware that he’s only very recently moved back there in order to assist his extremely elderly mother who still lives there. He’s lived most of his life in other places, actually. He’s written about this on his blog.
Ah. Sorry to hear that. But my response to that would still be, “bring mother to home, not go to mother”. I know it’s not always that simple, but I would take my mother hostage and kidnap her to where-ever, before you could get me to live in Cali.
Seriously, it truly is a disaster of multiple kinds and varieties just waiting to happen, and it’s all the government — not just local but state as well, since LA and SF dominate the state politics just as ridiculously incorrectly as NYCs dominates the otherwise fairly moderate NY state’s.
There seems to be something brain-killing in big cities. It’s like living there takes over your brain and replaces it with an idiot hive-mind. No, not all, but far too many.
The Newly Elected Ms Occasional-Cortex is a prime example. She supposedly has an economics degree. Yet she can’t even plan her finances for a simple move to another state, despite having a guaranteed income of nearly 200k in three months, when her job starts. Her ignorance of all things financial, economic, and business demonstrates two things:
1 – She was a diversity graduate.
2 – There’s a damned good reason despite the degree that she was working as a bartender.
:-/
Casualty reports from Paradise are coming in. Twenty-three dead in the area. There may be more. Lord have mercy.
FWIW, there are some GoFundMe sites etc for Paradise and other CA towns.
You can hit Gerard’s tip jar directly at his blog.
http://americandigest.org/wp/aint-too-proud-to-beg-paypal-donation-information-and-mailing-address/