Fire Helicopter One skimmed over the roofs of Fullerton, rotors
whumping, and banked east, crossing the 91 freeway into a national park
which from a distance appeared lush and green.
Scudding between
two canyons, however, you could see it was brown scrub – a desolate
vista of parched grass and stunted vegetation covering steep slopes.
"In
a normal year these hills would be covered with brilliant yellow and
purple wildflowers," said David Lopez, pointing out of the cockpit
window. "But because of the drought it's completely dry." He shook his
head. "It wouldn't take much for this place to go up."
Lopez, a fire captain with more than 20 years' experience combating blazes in southern
California, is bracing for a long, hot summer. A three-year drought has created tinderbox conditions across much of the American west.
"I've seen flames move faster than a
truck. Embers can fly across a highway and ignite the other side. In one hour a fire can go from one acre to a thousand."
A fire
torched thousands of acres in Arizona last week days after about a dozen
wildfires fuelled by strong winds and record temperatures flared across southern California.
Cooler
temperatures, when they come, may bring limited respite: climate change
has altered seasonal rhythms so that wildfires can, and do, erupt in
winter.
California's fire season was now two months longer than a
decade ago, requiring thousands of additional firefighters and
year-round mobilisation, governor Jerry Brown said last week. Humanity
was on a collision course with nature and California was in the
frontline despite state efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, he warned. "In the meantime, all we can do is
fight all these damn fires."
Lopez,
51, and his team of pilots at the Orange County fire authority base in
Fullerton, like other helicopter units around the country, are often the
first to
reach blazes in remote, rugged terrain.
On a good day, they
extinguish a fire before it spreads. On a bad day all they can do is try to steer it.
"We
want to get out there real quickly and keep it small by attacking it
with overwhelming force," he said. "If it's too late for that we try to
drive it in the direction we want it to go. It's kind of like herding
cattle."
Being buffeted by heat, smoke and wind as you hover 50ft
over a conflagration, waiting for just the right moment and angle to
unleash 360 gallons of water, and then returning to do it again and
again, affords a unique perspective on wildfires. "It's a lot like war.
The theories come from war fighting: massing of forces, anchoring and
flanking, attacking when the enemy is weak," said Lopez, as the
helicopter overflew ridges ravaged by fire last December, in the depth
of supposed winter.
Jim Davidson, 67, seated at the controls of
the Bell 412 twin-engine, nodded. He flew Hueys for the 1st Air Cavalry
Division in Vietnam. "Same principle. You're moving people, assets. The
conditions are extreme. You're trying to defeat the enemy."
Twice Davidson has helped
save
imperilled ground crews. "They were going to be hot dogs in a bun," he
said, recalling a crew surrounded by the 2007 Santiago fire. The flames
had cut their hose, leaving them without water and means of escape.
A
19-strong elite "Hotshot" crew battling the Yarnell Hill fire in
Arizona last June was not so lucky. All died, making it the deadliest
day for any US fire department since 9/11.
The federal forest
service and the state service, Cal Fire, have fleets of planes and
helicopters, but counties such as Orange, Los Angeles, Ventura and Kern
keep their own fleets. Often they are called out to rescue hikers or
mountain bikers – or horses, in a recent rescue conducted by Lopez's
team – but their main task is quenching fires.
Two of Orange
County's four helicopters are souped-up ex-army Hueys from Vietnam; the
others are more modern Bells. Each has a 360-gallon water tank. A hose
known as a snorkel enables them to refill in just 40 seconds – often
from reservoirs or golf course lakes.
Night vision goggles let the
Orange County pilots operate at night, a novelty, and iPads with
mapping software let them send photographs and coordinates from the air
to ground colleagues.
Power lines pose a grave danger, especially
when obscured by smoke. "I hate them. They're my worst enemy," said
Davidson. Another risk is collision from other aircraft clustered around
a fire zone, requiring what commanders call "ballet in the air".
A
long-term hazard, in addition to a heating planet, is economic
development. Criss-cross the county at 1,000ft and it is striking how
many bulldozers are carving out foundations for roads and houses in
previously uninhabited wilderness areas – multiplying the lives and
property to be defended.
Lopez pointed out homes in remote beauty
spots – many of them mansions with swimming pools – beside trees. Lovely
for shade and a leafy view but a disaster waiting to happen, said the
fire captain. "We just look at that as fuel."
Laguna Beach, a
wealthy area which lost 400 homes in a 1993 fire, has adapted: few of
the rebuilt homes abut trees, and herds of goats curb hillside
vegetation. "Some people have learned the lesson," said Davidson,
looking down. "Some have not."
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/31/californian-fire-fighters-braced-for-long-hot-busy-summer
The Gulf Stream system is known for its impact on Europe's mild climate. For quite some time oceanographers and climate scientists worry that its strength could decline due to the climate change. Unexpected help could come from the ocean currents south of Africa: researchers of the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR) and the University of Cape Town have discovered that the Agulhas Current transports more saline waters into the Atlantic. These could potentially contribute to stabilize the Gulf Stream system. The study will appear on 26 November in the scientific journals Nature.
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