What the HELL is wrong with the fire protection service in OK & TX?

[SoCalDem]

Our Calif firefighters would have had those fires knocked down pronto.. The land is FLAT there, most is open land, and yet they are losing houses like crazy..

Our firefighters are literally dropped into the fire, make stands around houses and save more than they lose, and climb mountains to put the fires out.

I just don;t get it :shrug:

Did those states even ask for outside help?

[Horse with no Name]

1. Even though I live here

I have to admit that since I have been out of state I haven't caught up completely with the wildfire story.
However, Red Adair's group could have had these fires put out--it is what they do.
I have no idea why they are continuing the way they are.:shrug:

[SoCalDem]

8. I am wondering if the governors of those states have screwed up royally

Why did they not ask for help, or maybe they cut a bit too much out of the budget, and cannot protect their citizens..:shrug:

[Horse with no Name]

12. I have to admit I was totally shocked during traveling

That our State rest areas are now outsourced to private companies.
I totally missed that one.
No doubt something has either been cut out of the budget or outsourced--or even worse, being overseen by more Republican cronies.

[liveoaktx]

14. Really. I knew that the Boondoggle 8 lane toll road was going to

be private but it didn't occur to me that they would do the same for the rest areas. Who owns them?

[SoCalDem]

15. McPooples Potties ?

subsidiary of McDonalds:evilgrin:

[Horse with no Name]

18. Ack I don't remember the name

But the rest stop on I-20 right before Weatherford has a huge sign with the name of the company--at the point we reached it, I had already driven 600 miles straight and probably wouldn't have been able to retain the names of my children if asked.:)

[karlrschneider]

53. I-20 doesn't go thru Okla...you probably thinking of I-40

Weatherford is due west of OKC

[Horse with no Name]

54. No.

I am thinking of I-20 in Texas which runs through Weatherford, TX which is due West of the DFW metroplex.
I can even drive cross country without a map.;)

[karlrschneider]

56. AHHH...okay sorry, the first Weatherford that came to my mind was the one

in Oklahoma!

[liveoaktx]

58. I can, too, I'll bet you drive the same way I do when I leave town

I go up 84, to Clovis, and then we catch 40 by going north from Fort Sumner.

[liveoaktx]

55. bet not-she said she was coming back from Phoenix and the

way back is not through Oklahoma but very well could have gone through Weatherford on I-20

[karlrschneider]

57. My bad, wrong Weatherford!

:D

[Horse with no Name]

59. It's all good

:hug:

[karlrschneider]

62. Pizza is like sex

When it's good, it's great. When it's bad, it's still pretty good.
:D

[ET Awful]

2. Hmmm, I wonder how many National Guard troops they could have used

to help fight the fires if they hadn't been somewhere else. . . . .

[babylonsister]

4. Great minds... my thoughts exactly! nt

[aquart]

7. Think FEMA will send in trailers?

Anything?

[texastoast]

25. There are already MANY trailers sitting in Waco

Unused. I don't know why.

[donheld]

75. Of course FEMA will send fire help -- to Wasington State

Just like ice to Maine.

[Bridget Burke]

Louisiana sent 3 National Guard Blackhawks....

A firefighting crew from the Louisiana National Guard on Thursday headed to Texas to help with the ongoing battle against wildfires that have charred more than 100 homes and killed four in that state and Oklahoma.

Three UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters rigged with firefighting water buckets departed Louisiana early Thursday for Grand Prairie, Texas, to help fight the fires which swept across nearly 20,000 acres in the two states.

"I am proud to send the very capable members and resources of the Louisiana National Guard to support our neighbors in Texas," said Gov. Kathleen Blanco in a news release. "The people of Texas and the Texas National Guard quickly came to Louisiana's aid when we needed it most. This support is one of the many ways we want to let our friends in Texas know that we will never forget their generosity to us."

www.tuscaloosanews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051229/APN/512290826&cachetime=3&template=dateline

These fires are NOT a regular occurrence. The state has had a year of record drought. The unseasonably warm weather has been pleasant here in Houston, but hasn't helped. North Texas often has some snow or ice by this time. And high winds made things worse.

[liveoaktx]

27. Remember last year how much it RAINED? It was flash floods all

the time all fall and winter.

[Bridget Burke]

42. Yup.

Houston even had a small flood this year. But we usually get several small ones or one big one.

The lawns & gardens are bone dry, but we're south of the fire country. Unless some idiots set off firecrackers for the New Year. Here in the Inner City, we mostly get idiots who fire their guns into the air as a celebration.

[Zen Democrat]

95. Houston is +6" rainfall for the year.

Central and West Texas has been in a drought all year.

[Coastie for Truth]

90. The resource issue is THE issue - and it is several problems

1. Bush Budget Priorities - Our local governments across the country have cut "First Responder" budgets with a chain saw. That is Fire, Police, Rescue Medics.

2. The Misuse of the National Guard - The National Guard is the local Governor's Army for "civil insurrection" - but mostly for natural disasters. But the National Guard is getting ready to go to Iraq, in Iraq, just back from Iraq. And recruiting and retention are way down.

3. Demographics of the Volunteer Community. Have you ever looked carefully at the Red Cross volunteers, the Salvation Army volunteers, the Southern Baptist Brotherhood volunteers, the Latter Day Saint volunteers, the Chabad volunteers, the Ham Radio volunteers, the http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/CERT| FEMA Community Emergency Response Team> volunteers? We're all on Social Security and Medicare.

Red Cross called us out for an apartment house fire last night - average age of the Red Cross responders -70. All on Lipitor and Metformin. :shrug:

In the town where I lived "back east" before I came to California - the "Chief Officer" for the "Fire Fighter Rehabilitation Company" of our local Volunteer Fire Department (that's the coffee and doughnuts for the fire fighters on the line) - was in his late 70's and had emphysema - and he was the "young guy" in the "Rehabilitation Company". :shrug:

[babylonsister]

3. It was really windy two days ago when the news of

these fires broke. I heard on the news last night that one kid with a pack of matches is, at this point, more dangerous than a kid with a gun.
Having said that, I wonder how many NG troops are no longer here to battle the blazes?

[OKNancy]

5. From what I heard on the news

It happened pretty fast.
It's not like it happens all the time, like in California. They can't just have a bunch of fire equipment and firefighters on duty all the time ( Oklahoma is a poor state)
Also the fires were spotty, in rural areas, and broke out in patches. It wasn't contained to one area.

That said, some folks were asking if maybe the rural fire departments couldn't get some budget help.

( Don't know anything about Texas)

[Vincardog]

6. It might have something to with the drought. We got half our average

rain fall this year. Then again there are a hell of a lot more people in California than Oklahoma. Could be y'all can afford more firemen and equipment than us poor folks.

[SoCalDem]

11. or maybe your governor is not "on top" of things

not that OURS is, but after a few hours, someone there had to have an inkling that it was beyond their capabilities.. Calif sends firebombers and crews all over the place.. LA COUNTY fire & rescue were on the scene in New Orleans a day after the flooding started.. We do help anyone who asks..

[liveoaktx]

21. They did, in every case. The problem comes in some of the more rural

towns, like Cross Plains, which is far away from any main town, where the fire started, and the winds spread it immediately.

The thing is, it's almost impossible to know WHERE a fire is going to break out. There are people who are disobeying burn bans that have been in effect for months.

[justabob]

35. Its bad this year

even in those summers when we went something like 85+ days with no rain, I don't remember plants and trees that look 'crispy', for lack of a better word. I also never remember hearing of a "red flag" fire ban before this year.

I do not know much about what is going on with our wildfires, I've not been watching the news, but I do know that rural Texas has a lot of volunteer fire departments using old equipment.

[HereSince1628]

9. Because California has suburban brush fires weekly CA has more practice?

Well, not weekly, but so regularly that CA really does have the equipment and manpower on hand.

Places that don't burn so often don't carry that sort of fire protection force.

[liveoaktx]

10. Not fair. Some of the places that burn are rural communities and even

if the fire department was there right away, it was incredibly windy the day that the fires were so bad.

It ISN"T that they're not trying to fight it. Here's a local article about it.

http://www.hcnews.com/news/get-news.asp?id=11418&catid=1&cpg=get-news.asp

[SoCalDem]

13. I am NOT criticizing the firefighters.. But I have to wonder

why the request for help (official request) was not made..If Blanco can get pilloried by the press, why aren't the media types asking what's up .

[Name removed]

16. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[liveoaktx]

19. Excuse me but there are a lot of Texans on this board who are NOT crackers

as you so colorfully put it.

[TX-RAT]

33. What a horrible thing to say, hope your proud of yourself

4 dead and close to 100 houses lost.

[karlrschneider]

46. There are plenty of progressives, liberal democrats even in Oklahoma

so please don't get too carried away there, bub. We have a Dem governor.
Remember, "All generalizations stink, including this one."

[Nicole]

70. I hope your heart gets an intervention from somewhere

People are losing their lives & homes. But hey, if it makes you feel better, there's a few less "yon crackers" here now.

[liveoaktx]

17. Paragraph

Fire marshal Roger Deeds was able to assess the fire from a Department of Public Service helicopter. “The view from the air helped up get a better angle on the fire,” he said.
“We had a plane from the Texas Forest Service come in and drop two loads of water. They were able to hit a couple places that we couldn’t get to.”


I remember watching sometime this year high winds in California that devasted some cities and towns and it didn't matter a bit whether help was called in.

Saying that this was an unusual situation. Drought, worst in 50 years, extremely high winds (which normally aren't anything to worry about except for tornadoes) all happening very quickly. From what I could see on CNN, the fires broke out in multiple areas all at about the same time, and spread FAST because of the wind. But immediately the Texas Forest Service was called in to help via air.

I'm following this closely because I live near THREE counties that had this problem. I smelled smoke and saw it in the sky the other night at dusk and now I think it must have been from Cross Plains.

[SoCalDem]

20. I have a good friend in Yukon.

Their place is fantastic.. I hope they and their horses are all right.They won;t even be back home until after new years.. I(or maybe they came home when the fires started) haven't heard from them yet..got their voice mail when I called

[ecoalex]

23. Ok Oklahoma then?

The point is the dummies started the fires. I live in Ca, and even in the most remote areas they fight the fires.

With all the farmers they should be out in force disking the ground up to slow the fires when the wind died down some.

[liveoaktx]

24. What makes you think people aren't out fighting the fires? Please

[Bridget Burke]

32. Requests HAVE been made & Texans have fought the fires.

Kennedale Mayor Jim Norwood said Tuesday night that about 300 acres in the town had burned. "Most of the people in the community here pulled together and kept it from getting into our neighborhoods," he said. "It has quieted down quite a bit." Some residents used garden hoses to help keep flames at bay and shovels to douse hot spots.

Perry's disaster declaration allowed him to activate the state emergency management plan, placing the Division of Emergency Management in charge.

He said four helicopters from the National Guard -- plus two single-engine air tankers and two helicopters from the U.S. Forest Service -- were being deployed in the firefighting effort.

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/12/27/grass.fires/

The Louisiana National Guard & firefighters from Alabama also offered assistance, although the strong winds have died down. The sudden high winds surprised everyone & made the disaster much worse.

There's no record of Perry talking to FEMA. Even our good little Republican Governor criticized that gang of idiots after their non-response to Hurricane Rita.

[TreasonousBastard]

28. Local volunteer FDs are handling these? Yeah, I know...

they do a great job, but they're usually not funded for the best equipment, and their training isn't always so hot. Who in a volunteer FD can organize for a major plains fire like these are? Looks like they're doing a heroic job, but it's just too big a job.

I don't know the whole story, but it just seems like thse fires need serious state and federal coordination and manpower to get things under control.

And, yeah, that wind in a flat, dry area would be one of the firefighters worst nightmares. Blowing burning twigs and embers all over the place starting fires faster than you can put them out and making firebreaks useless.

[liveoaktx]

31. No, it is NOT just local fire departments working on this-it's also

state agencies. I'm sure you may not be watching this as closely as I am, but if you were, you'd see interviews of Texas State Agencies who are doing flyovers.

[SoCalDem]

34. Oklahoma cut funding for fire training back in 03 according to google

...

[TX-RAT]

44. Most, if not all county fire fighters in TX, are volunteers.

Our particular volunteer fire dept receives no money from the feds, the state, the county, or the city's. They receive only donations, or pay for it out of their own pockets.

[Skittles]

51. and they do a damn good job

I'll never forget coming home to my boyfriend's farm by the Oklahoma border and most of his 25 acres was charred from a grass fire; the volunteers worked in 100+ degree temperatures for hours and saved the house, barn and all the animals. The only evidence we saw they were there is there were empty gatorate bottles everywhere and we saw it on the news. We put a thank you in the rural paper and donated to them.

[TX-RAT]

84. They sure do.

One of our local ranchers was so proud of the work our local VFD did, in putting out a large fire on his ranch, that he donated a brand new foam truck to the VFD. He lost a little over 6 square miles of his place, and came very close to his 100+ year old ranch house.

[Vincardog]

41. Who you going to call FEMA?

[XOKCowboy]

50. I didn't want to say that

because volunteer firefighters do an incredible job but they're not trained to fight grass fires. It's a whole different animal than a house fire.

[mtnester]

79. Large scale wildfire extinguishment is its own specialty

there is intensive specialized training for fighting wildfires on a large scale. Many times, rural fire departments that are mostly made up of volunteers cannot even afford a fax machine or phone line for one, let alone come up with the jack for expensive, specialized training beyond the required basic level of firefighter training required to simply charge up hose and spray it something.

Even in larger urban departments, there may be only a few or less firefighters who have been through the schooling to fight these kinds of blazes. In areas where this type of wildfire happens a lot, more people are trained for it because it is a regular occurrence.

At our department, we have one firefighter who has been through the wildfire training, and it required a trip out west to get the training from those who fight this kind of thing regularly.

Hell, they may not even have the proper gear to go around...many times volunteer departments share gear. Calling in troops who specialize this (like from CA) would be a good idea.

[XOKCowboy]

22. Oklahoma grass fires

Add knee high thick dry grass and 40 mph winds together and you get a firestorm that is upwards of 20 feet high and moving at 40 mph unimpeded. They're impossible to fight head on. You have to use backfires and hope that the wind doesn't change.

I agree with you point that they seemingly could have done more to protect the houses but these things can come up in a flash.

[liveoaktx]

26. That's the point-these are FLASH fires that, in one place, Kennedale

LEAPT from house to house due to the high winds.

And it's not that there aren't all kinds of people out there trying to stop it. I watched on the local news last night firefighters in Wise County, Texas (near Boyd) with exhausted firemen on the film.

[Birthmark]

29. A little story.

When we had those massive brushfires here in FL a few years ago, one county (which is heavily Republican) was particularly hard hit. Turns out that these people had voted down the money to improve their fire services a year or two before. Of course, that didn't stop them from screaming and crying about how lousy the fire department was. I can't help but wonder if Oklahoma, being heavily Republican, hasn't had a similar lack of funding.

[Warpy]

30. Uh, this is a rural area

The fire equipment is adequate for the occasional small house fire.

However, drought and high winds plus some fool burning garbage or just tossing a cig butt out his car window can cause a huge, fast moving range fire. A local volunteer fire department that's just fine when it comes to putting out a garage fire is quickly overwhelmed by a range fire traveling at 50+ miles an hour and setting multiple houses at a time ablaze.

Think CONTEXT, people. This is a disaster. You're asking why the citizens of New Orleans couldn't just go out with buckets and bail their city dry.

[MadHound]

36. Spoken like one who hasn't battled a grass fire,

Or any other sort of fire.

In the beginnings of a forest fire, like the ones that go up in CA, the forest itself will help slow down the fire, acting as a windbreak. Out on the OK prarie, there is no such windbreak, just miles upon miles of dry, waist high grass, interrupted by the occaissonal house or community. Thus, when a fire sparks off, it gets going fast and strong. Add in 40mph winds and fire can move real fast, faster than the local fire department's ability to contain it.

Add in the fact that it is dry down there, bone dry, and a fair number of fires are going out in areas that are literally in the middle of nowhere, with nearest fire dept thirty minutes away at best. In addition, these are poor counties in a poor state. They don't have the equipment to properly fight these fires, because those monies have been diverted to Homeland Security or some other such assinine thing, or better yet, the money has been devoted to Western states, including California, because there have been so many fires out there in the past five years.

As to why the didn't ask for help, I don't know, but they're asking now. And it certainly doesn't help that members of the OK National Guard are in Iraq rather than at home where they're needed.

Judging OK's problems through the lens of California's situation is unfair. You folks have been battling fires for decades now, and are well equipped, with much of the federal monies going out your way. You have people in place, and equipment available. Sadly, OK doesn't have these resources to draw upon, thus they are going up in flames. And to blame the victims is never good form. They're doing what they can, tell you what, why doesn't California ship a few of those tanker planes over to OK. It would sure help a lot, and it is only fair, since OK taxpayers' dollars helped to buy them.

[TX-RAT]

37. Ever try to put a fire out, thats moving at 30 mph

Some of these are in remote areas with no roads.

[Bridget Burke]

38. Do you "get it" yet?

If necessary, I'll re-post links to the stories about Governors using their emergency services & asking for outside help. And about the people, themselves, fighting the fires.

Louisiana sent help--why not California? Since you guys are the experts & all...

[Coastie for Truth]

94. Say again please

Los Angeles, Menlo Park, San Jose, plus a few others.

[Liberal In Texas]

39. Another reason: Tuesday when I was driving through the widespread

fire zone, they were saying on the radio that it was so windy, the fire-fighting helicopters that drop water couldn't fly.

Also, you can't believe how much of it there was, miles and miles of scattered fires as I drove down I-35 in southern Oklahoma.

[Fleshdancer]

47. were you struck in traffic too???

I was driving down I-35 in southern OK last Tuesday too and we sat there for an hour and a half before the police directed us to some tiny town east of the highway. Driving through the smoke was complete hell!

[Liberal In Texas]

69. I was lucky. I heard 35 was closed when I was in Ok City

and decided to go through anyway as there is no real good alternative. By the time I got down there, 35 was reopened and traffic flowing normally. There was a hell of a lot of smoke though. And fires. Even one of the metal guard rail supports was burning.

[Fleshdancer]

93. Sounds like you came through several hours after I did

I sat in my car and watched a fire fighter try to keep one of the "smaller" fires from reaching the highway. It's weird watching something like that less than 40 yards away...the man looked pissed and frustrated for good reason. My guess is that the fires started not too long before we arrived because the local fire trucks and police cars were still arriving. I turned on the AM radio to see if there was any local news and a woman who was driving northbound described watching the flames jump over the median into the highway.

I'm impressed that you were able to stay on the highway. Since I got re-routed, I didn't see the burning guard rails...creepy. The first responders were working their butts off and the majority of them (that I saw) were still in their street clothes.

[liveoaktx]

40. Have to say, this would be ONE GOOD DAY for Bush to be out clearing brush

After all, he is not far away at all from these fires.

[karlrschneider]

43. We simply have not expended the resources necessary to deal with

a fifty year drought. We have had numerous wildfires even here in Eastern (Green country) Oklahoma but so far our rural volunteer fire dept's have done pretty well for what they have to work with. I'm not an active fire fighter but I help out the local FD with technical advice...their radio system, computers, mechanical maintenance and so forth.

Our state (and Texas also to a degree) is subject to some of the widest variations in weather in the country. It can go below zero in winter and over 110 in summer. But we can't justify spending huge amounts to prepare for those infrequent extremes. There has to be a tradeoff between full readiness and fiscal responsibility.

It has been around 70 degrees around here lately. We can talk about global warming in another venue, but the current situation is what we're trying to deal with...

[TX-RAT]

48. Well said, Thank you.

[karlrschneider]

52. thanks...to be fair, we have lots of forests over this way which helps

somewhat (and lots of hills too which is sometimes a good thing and other times is bad, depending on the wind.)

These fires can travel almost as fast as the wind and that can be 40 or 50 MPH sometimes.

[madokie]

92. Well said Karl n/t

[Fleshdancer]

45. I drove through part of it last Tuesday....

I was traveling south on IH-35 and once we were south of Oklahoma City I could see the smoke. About 10 minutes later, traffic was completely stopped and we sat there for an hour and a half. One of the AM radio stations said the fire jumped the median and that's why all traffic was stopped. The local police and fire fighters were still arriving at that point but it was a small rural area with very small fire trucks and probably volunteer fire fighters.

Keep in mind that the wind was very strong that day and the grass was bone dry. It doesn't take much time for wildfires to grow in those conditions and it would be hard to manage even if there was a large amount of firefighters and state of the art equipment readily available.

Overall, I think the firefighters are doing their best with what they have. I heard on the news today that Oklahoma didn't receive a drop of rain for the entire month of November so that has a lot to do with it.

[Cleita]

49. There is that problem with the National Guard being elsewhere

and true we get firefighters from Idaho, Washington and Montana to help fight the fires, like we help them when they have fires. Maybe someone should tell them, that there is help out there.

[gulfcoastliberal]

60. Sounds like texas has cut its firefighting budget significantly!

Fee increases proposed, agency move pending

The Texas Commission on Fire Protection, like most state government agencies, started the 79th Legislative Session with instructions to cut five percent of its budget for the upcoming biennium. The cuts could have resulted in the loss of staff and a reduction in the commission's operating budget. On top of last session's cuts of roughly 12.5 percent and three FTEs, the proposed cuts would have had a significant impact on the agency's ability to meet its statutory requirements.

In hearings before the House Appropriations Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, the possibility of raising certification and renewal fees from the current $20 to $25 was discussed as a way to maintain the commission's funding at current levels. In the past, however, all fees that the agency collected went into the state's General Fund. In order for the agency to receive any direct benefit from a fee increase, a budget rider allocating collected fees to the agency was required.

The statute governing the commission, Chapter 419 of the Government Code, has a certification fee cap of $35, but the fee has remained at $20 since the agency's inception, barring a short period recently in which the fee was raised to $21 for one renewal cycle to cover a legislatively mandated audit.

http://www.tcfp.state.tx.us/newsletter/newsletter_current.asp

[Coastie for Truth]

96. When I was Regular Coast Guard

Fire Protection for the Ship Channel was provided by the oil and chemical companies' fire brigades -- and then by the municipal fire departments on a "Mutual Assisnatne Agreement" basis (and then by the Coast Guard).

Chemical plant/refinery fire is a different animal then a structural fire or a wilderness fire, too.

[B Calm]

61. You think they suck at firefighting, you should see them at snow removal

[karlrschneider]

64. Yep, true enough, because we rarely get significant amounts of snow.

We do, however, get fairly frequent ICE storms and you can't remove that stuff without gouging up the roads. It's a lose-lose situation.

[B Calm]

65. Have they ever heard of SALT!!!

[karlrschneider]

66. Yes, we have heard of salt. Several kinds of salt. Chlorides of

Sodium, Calcium... Epson, Of the Earth, and so forth. Beside the fact that it takes several tons per mile to 'treat' the roads, it fucks up paved surfaces really efficiently, so we use it sparingly and only when absolutely necessary. Thank you for your support.

[B Calm]

67. Got that right, they use it sparingly and many people die in accidents

because your filthy republican politicians are giving your tax dollars to corporate interests instead of buying much needed road salt!!

[tammywammy]

77. In the DFW area

they mostly use sand on the roadways during an ice storm, since snow storms are such a rare event down here.

But, I'm glad that everything is so perfect in Indiana for you. :)

[B Calm]

78. I drive an 18 wheeler all across the midwest!

[RoyGBiv]

82. Horse manure ...

You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

[B Calm]

83. Oh please!! I was stranded on I-44 for 6 hours one winter day because

the state was to lazy to salt the interstate and vehicles couldn't climb a little hill. Traffic was backed up for over a 100 miles through southern Missouri into Oklahoma.

Two days after a heavy snowfall, I travelled east across route 19 from I-35 going to Ada Oklahoma. Approx 40 miles across a snow packed road that took me about 3 hours to drive.

Southern Kansas is the same damn way anytime there is a little ice or snow.

[bmbmd]

63. Worst post ever.

You should be ashamed of yourself. There are hundreds, no, thousands of brave men and women risking their lives to fight these fires, and you denigrate their courage and dedication? I live in Grayson County Texas, and our local coverage was replete with scenes of homeowners standing on top of their homes with water hoses, citizen fire fighters leaving their homes and jobs to assist those in need, and professionals leading the way. The three thousand acre Pottsboro fire was made worse because half of the equipment was in Achille Ok helping our friends and neighbors across the Red River. A grass fire is not the same as a brush fire by any stretch of the imagination-they spread in excess of the speed of the prevailing wind. And don't whine about those famous Southern California Santa Ana winds-people on the plains know a thing or two about wind. Today, as I look out my window, I don't see any smoke, I don't smell any ash, and I don't hear emergency vehicles tearing down the road. I say they did a pretty damn good job taming the Achille and Pottsboro fires.

By the way-we don't have the worst governor in the country. He's forty-second.

[Horse with no Name]

68. The fires were in Pottsboro too?

Wow.

[madokie]

89. Thanks for the help you guys sent to us

And guess what Oklahoma probably has the best Governor of all, Brad Henry. When the fires came through here they were traveling at a sw to ne direction at +45 mph no roads travel that direction, all you can do is try to save your ass. The original poster pissed me off also.

[TriMetFan]

71. So with all the fires and the drought will this become

the next dust bowl?:shrug:

[RoyGBiv]

72. Have you ever seen a prarie fire at work?

It starts and, literally, ten minutes later it has engulfed 100 acres. You can actually time these things as they move and not get bored with it. They move, fast. I watched one of the fires today as a spark landed in the middle of some hay. It took it less than five minutes to spread into a 50 yard long line and march forward 200 yards, leaving nothing but black in its wake. It hit the Canadian River, and the line stopped, but sparks flew out in all directions, starting new fires that, one again, took off.

As you say, the land is flat, and this is dry brush burning. It just goes POOF and stops when it hits a wide enough river.

You can ask for help, and by the time it gets here, the entire state is gone.

[RoyGBiv]

73. This thread pisses me off ...

I have read some asinine things on DU in my time here, but some of this is taking the cake. (THis is not directed at the OP, although I think the questioning could have been worded in a less accusatory manner.)

I watched a home burn today as firefighters and family tried to save it. Ten minutes before fire hit it, there was no fire anywhere they could see until all of a sudden it screamed over a hill running like a jack rabbit and jumped on the roof.

No one here is waiting for GOD to intervene. No one here is a dumbass redneck too fucking idiotic to ask for help.

Geezus H Christ. The prejudice and ignorance of people is irritating.

[madokie]

91. ME TOO

And to think the original poster's grandparents probably came from around here during the dust bow days.

[SoCalDem]

100. I had no intention of pissing anyone off

Perhaps I could have worded it better, but my intention was to call attention to the GOVERNMENTAL oversight of fire protection..Most of the responders "got it", some did not.

Governors and state legislators carry on their business as if nothing bad will ever happen, and for most, they get lucky, but when fires break out, or rivers flood, the EVIDENCE of their neglect to funding emergency services is pretty obvious.

Vast expanses of open grassland, relying on volunteer services with sub-par equipment is not a very good idea. Apparently, the conditions for fire existed for a while before they actually broke out. I was just amazed to see that the fires had gone on for so many days without a lot of success in fighting them.

I have nothing but respect for the people on the ground and in the air fighting them, but their efforts are only as good as the organization BEHIND them...equipment and manpower costs money, and if the legislature wastes what tax money there is, things like this are sure to follow.

Even though Arnold is a piss poor example of a governor, he had little luck in cutting funding for essential protective services.

It's true that we have more experience at firefighting, but we are also very aware of the money it costs to have a top notch response team available.

I watched for weeks on end how Blanco was pilloried after Katrina, and yet I have seen little or nothing mentioned yet about how the governors of Texas & Oklahoma may not have been as prepared as they should be.

[madokie]

101. You don't under stand

there is no getting ready for these grass fires in windy weather, simple. and once they start best get the hell out of the way, fact.

[SoCalDem]

102. perhaps, BUT cutting funds to the services needed for them when they DO

occur is not a good idea. and relying on volunteer services canot be the best way to combat them..

anyhoo.. I feel very sorry for the people who are affected, and never intended to lay the "blame" at their feet,. I know they are trying as hard as they can...I only wish they were better equipped to handle these wildfires.:hug:

[RoyGBiv]

104. You're missing the point ...

You do not fight a prairie fire. You do not put it out. At best, you contain it, and by that I mean attempt to prevent it from spreading a 100 miles in two hours and keeping it out of major population centers. That can be done, and fire fighters here, from Texas, Kansas, and Arkansas have done a masterful job of doing it. We had a fire some years ago that basically traveled up the Turner Turnpike from OKC to Tulsa without anyone even slowing it down. You know, I assume, that one of the tactics used in Western forest fires covering massive areas is to light controlled burns to prevent the fire from spreading. In a prairie area hit by the kind of drought we've had, you cannot do that on the same scale. Every fire set is almost immediately out of control. They spread faster than the trucks can drive along the rural roads of OK. Seriously think about a fire moving at 40 mph. It is very hard to imagine unless you've seen it.

In any case, as I said, my pissed-offed-ness wasn't directed at you, but some of the other idiotic comments I've seen in this thread, suggestions that Okies generally are just too friggin stupid to know any better. That's the same kind of bullshit I heard wingers babbling about people in New Orleans, and I will not just sit here and tolerate it because I happen to live in a so-called red state that's a part of flyover country. Real people are really dying and are losing everything. I won't ever claim our government is the best or most efficient in the world, but our governor is doing a damn fine job of trying.

And on a related note, the security guard where I work, who is also a police officer, predicted this very scenario several months ago and worked with both county and state governments to "beg, borrow, and steal" as much fire-fighting equipment as they could for these sparsely populated areas with no coherent, local infrastructure. Some of those trucks you've been seeing in the news are brand new, in the sense of new to those areas, precisely because many people in our government were trying months ago to prepare for this. But, as mentioned originally, you can't fully prepare. You don't know where they are going to start, and you have no idea where they may go. Winds change in OK this time of year faster than you can blink, and I literally mean the wind can change directions a dozen times in a single 24 hour period. One minute, the fire is headed for the river, the next it is moving into open pasture land. When it does the latter, the pasture is going to burn, period.

[tamtam]

74. Remember the cedar fire?

The cedar fire in Southern California where quite a bit of San Diego burned to the ground. That fire was a monster, Mirimar caught on fire, Julian caught on fire at pretty much the same time. The fire got so big it was skipping across I-15 the smoke was so bad people couldn't see to drive. I remember that fire very well because as it was coming toward Alpine my family was evacuating along with hundreds of others; we barely made it out in time. The power was out for a week and when we did go back to our home a week latter the air was still filled with ash. The city of San Diego was in a stand still, it got pretty damn nasty. I'm sorry but the Fire Department was caught off guard that year and as a result many people lost their homes. It took them a week to contain the cedar fire. If I remember (at the time) there was some squabble over using outside help (military choppers) to contain the fire and as a result many people lost their homes and it didn't have to be that way. The state of California made huge mistakes and as a result some people lost their lives and some people lost their homes. I know the policy has changed a bit since the cedar fire but to some Californians it's too little too late. Oh and let's not forget the Red Cross fiasco but that is for another thread.

[MindPilot]

76. talk about a fast-moving fire!!

I live in the middle of the city--wildfires are the least of my concerns. BUT that morning I got up to a smoke-filled (and I do mean "filled") sky. The news reports told of a big fire but out in the wilderness and a good forty miles away. Nothing for me to worry about. A couple of hours later put the news on again and it was ten miles away!

For those first critical hours--because of budget cuts and other federal bungling--we had no heavy firefighting aircraft.

[Coastie for Truth]

97. I was there for the Red Cross

and one of the Fire Fighters from a neighboring community lost his life.

And my 80 year old aunt in Rancho Bernardo took in some victims.

[andino]

80. One word...... Winds.......

Its hard to fight a fire in 30+ MPH winds.

[RoyGBiv]

81. Particularly ...

When the fire tends to move faster than the winds.

A prairie fire is a viscous beast.

[0007]

85. What's wrong with most folks living in Tom DeLay's state

and the ones up above. Thinking of J.C. Watts.

[RoyGBiv]

105. I dunno ...

What the fuck is wrong with them? What the fuck does this have to do with a fire killing people?

Seriously. You tell me. What the hell is wrong with us people "above" those people who are living in Delay's state that we had a fire burning us all to hell. What the fuck is wrong with those people living in that state where Delay is from who are also dying from fires. Must be our fault. We deserve it I guess, being from red states and all ... flyover country, just dumbass hicks.

Fuck us.

[porphyrian]

86. Reeeeal good barbeque. - n/t

[Coastie for Truth]

87. Because of our "foothill wilderness fires" and earthquakes

we have a tremendous amount of citizen awareness and participation in emergency preparedness. California has one of the best with tremendous outreach to our diverse communities. Same thing for our Red Cross Disaster Service Volunteers.

Say and post what you want about the Red Cross's National HQ and its National Leadership and National fund raising/finances - the local California Volunteer community is a doppleganger in a different universe from the alleged scandals

[madokie]

88. we lost 20 plus house here a couple weeks ago

and you californian aren't gonna drop down and stop these things, The fire front was moving at + 45 mph, you barely have a chance to get the fuck out, sorry. Nothing wrong with our firefighters. and you got to be shitting me, its mostly flat here, sure.:sarcasm: just stay in calif.

[Coastie for Truth]

98. Really

You posted

Our Calif firefighters would have had those fires knocked down pronto.. The land is FLAT there, most is open land, and yet they are losing houses like crazy..

Really? As in "Cedar" and "Gilroy"

[begin_within]

99. Usually, but remember the Cedar fire in San Diego - 270,000 acres, 16 dead

[BlueCollar]

103. Living in Texas

my answer is that we brought this on ourselves.

Our steadfast refusal to "pay taxes" brought the inevitable.

No Taxes = No Services...and that includes funding fire-departments and related logistics.