Huge California wildfire on verge of containment
http://www.google.com/hostednews/...x2tUqZabHmTrYwlYv6lz09UwD9ATSU600
"The fire burned away traffic signs and wooden posts holding up guardrails along forest highways with perilously steep dropoffs. Boulders rolling off bare mountainsides require trucks with plows to constantly patrol to keep roads clear for work crews and repair vehicles.The California Department of Transportation has already put out $12 million in emergency contracts for urgent work such as replacing guardrails — using metal posts this time.....Freeman said all the work will take about five weeks, keeping the forest closed to the public until it's complete."
Several injured in Mt. Baldy traffic collision
http://www.sbsun.com/breakingnews/ci_13374055?source=rss
"Six people were injured Saturday afternoon during a traffic collision on Mt. Baldy Road.
Firefighters and California Highway Patrol officers responded at 4:35 p.m. to the 6800 block of Mt. Baldy Road near the Buckhorn Lodge & Restaurant, according to a dispatch supervisor with the San Bernardino County Fire Department. Five people were taken to local hospitals by ambulances while a sixth was airlifted. The conditions of the patients were not immediately available."
Note: comments section mention more accurate description was van losing its breaks and people jumping for their lives...."
National public lands day Sat Sept 26th
http://www.publiclandsday.org
There are a couple listed for the Angeles Forest, but site's last updated date is unknown(could have been pre-Station fire).
Historical: Old Baldy, 1913
http://glendorahistory.blogspot.com/2008/01/old-baldy.html
"The Serrano knew it as any number of words: Jóaka’j, Juáka, Joakaits, and Hesakkopa; the Gabrielino called it Juáka’j and Hifá’do and also referred to it as Yoát, which means snow; the Luiseńo knew it as Hifá’doyah; while the Cauhilla called it as Hifá’doga and the Mohave named it Avii Kwatiinyam....in 1841, at the height of his own power in the Los Angeles area, Antonio Maria Lugo christened the tallest mountain he had ever seen Mount San Antonio after Saint Antonio of Padua......About this time, at least it was reported in an 1871 edition of the Los Angeles Star, people started to refer to Mount San Antonio as Mt. Baldy and Old Baldy. "
09/26/2009 09:26 Being in a closed area SGC east fork at bridge
09/26/2009 16:20 Fishing/Hiking Violations Jackson Lake & Arch Picnic Area
09/27/2009 09:40 3 Vehicles With Mountain Bikes Big Pines
09/27/2009 09:48 Recreating During Closure Table Mountain
09/27/2009 10:30 Hiking Inside Forest Closure Blue Ridge hiking trail
09/27/2009 14:14 Vehicle In Closure Lower San Antonio
09/27/2009 14:16 Being In Closure Area Mt Baldy
09/27/2009 14:57 Looting Big Tujunga Canyon
09/27/2009 16:37 Recreating In Closure Highway 39 mm 21.04
Brent Roath quickly recast the question. Yes, he agreed, the U.S. Forest Service scientists who have spent the last two weeks in the San Gabriel Mountains examining the effects of the Station fire are like forensic pathologists combing a crime scene.
Except in this case, the patient is still alive.
"We're more like doctors, and our patient is ill. We're trying to figure out how to make it better," said Roath, regional director of post-burn analysis and a 33-year Forest Service veteran.
Although the 45-member team's report will remain under wraps for some time, the preliminary findings are in: Don't pray for rain.
Using sophisticated burn maps generated by satellite imagery and factoring in the breathtaking steepness of the now-denuded hillsides, the scientists warn that even moderate winter rain could trigger landslides and catastrophic debris flows capable of inundating many of the San Gabriels' 37 foothill communities.
Beyond that, the scientists concluded that although 250 square miles of the Angeles National Forest burned, the trees and chaparral in the fire-adapted ecosystem will bounce back.
However, much of the wildlife that makes its home in the 655,000-acre forest was killed or dislocated. Biologists say they found an unusually high number of large animals caught by the fast-moving fire. Teams have come across carcasses of bears, mountain lions, bobcats, coyotes and gray foxes, apparently unable to find escape routes.
"Deer took a big hit," said Kevin Cooper, a wildlife biologist.
The BAER team (for Burned Area Emergency Response) worked 14-hour days to complete its work, retreating each night to laptops at the "BAER Den," a Residence Inn conference room in Burbank.
Specialists were on the ground in every part of the 160,000-acre burn area, measuring, photographing and testing. The team included soil scientists, hydrologists, archaeologists, botanists, wildlife experts and a hazardous materials crew. The fire peeled back a layer of cover to reveal unknown Native American oven sites, scores of illegal dumps and a stash of 50-gallon drums filled with an as-yet unidentified liquid.
One day last week, Roath steered a white Forest Service SUV up the Angeles Crest Highway, which was closed to the public but nonetheless busy. Crews used graders to clear boulders, semi-tractor-trailers hauled debris and workers with chain saws cut trees that threatened to fall across traffic lanes.
Overhead, helicopters carried water-dropping buckets or ferried dangling loads of replacement utility poles.
For the most part, the landscape was devoid of color. Gray-white ash has banked in places, like dandruff on the shoulders of the mountains. Roath, a soil scientist who began his Forest Service career on the Angeles, is still awed by the immense natural forces once marshaled to lift this mountain range that is still rising and settling.
He noted that debris cones -- accumulated rock and sand at the bottom of sharply defined ridges -- are sprouting up everywhere, as though the mountains are shedding dead skin.
The San Gabriel Mountains have the potential to unleash calamity under normal circumstances, without the overlay of fire to complicate things. They are mountains on the move; the rock is fractured and disintegrating.
Roath said that as BAER team members collected their data, they could hear the rattling sound of mountains falling.
"In some cases boulders are coming down from gravity alone. They don't need rain," Roath said.
Vegetation plays a critical role in shoring up hillsides. When rains come, the drops hit the plant canopy first, which slows the water and distributes it more evenly into the soil. Absent vegetation, rain pounds down and washes away topsoil, sand, small rocks and burned plant material.
Thus begins a process that scientists call "entraining" -- the terrible freight of broken mountainside that gathers energy as it roars inexorably downhill.
Storms cause sediment to back up in ravines already loaded with fire debris. The flow bulges and spreads, picking up larger stones, then boulders. It gains speed as it descends, blowing obstacles out of its way. That debris, too, joins the train. As highway culverts become full, the entire river of rock flows over the roadway, collapsing it.
The broken asphalt then becomes a passenger on the cascading wreckage.
Trees, automobiles and houses scarcely slow the torrent.
"Debris flows are a little hard to control," said Sue Cannon, a debris flow expert with the U.S. Geological Survey in Denver, adding that the San Gabriels present a "classic setting for major debris flow."
Along the upper Big Tujunga Road, fire appeared to have followed the drainage, burning trees that straddled the creek, leaving "a pretty well-toasted riparian area," said Jan Beyers, a Forest Service plant ecologist.
Cooper, the wildlife biologist, noted that the Station fire took out trees along the streams, such as white alder. Large trees are like straws, sucking water from rivers and streams, and in their absence, he said, there has been a measurable increase in stream levels in the Angeles National Forest.
Elsewhere along the road, a row of roasted pine trees offered clues to the fire's behavior. Their brown needles point sideways, petrified at an acute angle, like a heavily gelled hairdo. This, the scientists explained, is an example of "fire freeze," the result of a hot wind blasting through, wringing the last drop of moisture out of the tree.
Where some see withered plants and scoured hillsides, Beyers sees decades of patient aspiration come to fruition -- the "shooters and seeders."
Trees that have lost limbs to fire will grow new, sturdier arms. Plants that have been annually depositing seeds in subterranean "seed banks" will be rewarded with young growth rising out of soil rejuvenated with nitrogen-bearing nutrients.
"There are seeds in the soil here that have been waiting decades for this chance," she said wistfully.
Indeed, for some growing things, fire is a bonanza. Certain species of conifers require heat to release seeds from their tightly closed cones. Some plants need the fire's heat to crack hard seed coatings in order to sprout. Some plants thrive on the chemicals produced from ash leaching into soil. Smaller bushes, crowded out by larger neighbors before the fire, flourish afterward in their newfound elbow room.
The seed caches of ground-dwelling rodents will be disinterred, and the still-viable seeds dispersed by ants and birds, everyone pitching in to repair their habitat.
In the San Gabriels' chaparral system, more plants survive fire than most people think, Beyers said. That's explained, in part, because of "fire residence," or the length of time that flames and heat linger in a particular spot. Chaparral plant communities don't produce a lot of leaf litter or vegetation that accumulates on the ground, which would become fuel for fires.
Then there is the profusion of wildflowers that will debut in the spring. The fire followers: purple lupines, morning glories, California poppies, larkspurs, wild sweet peas and snapdragons.
"Ten years from now," Beyers said, taking in the charred hillside and smiling, "you can come back here and never know there was a fire at all."
julie.cart@latimes.com
"MT. BALDY - Several "no trespassing" signs are posted on the trees crowning over a road leading up to Brant's residence.
But they have done little to deter a small black bear from wandering onto the 23-acre ranch almost nightly this summer.
"I heard him (Sept. 17) in the laundry room," Ed Brant said. "He smelled the cat food we keep in the cabinet. They are usually not that aggressive."
As Brant and his wife Patti settled in for the night, the bear came down the hill, looking for a snack.
He pushed his way into a small room near Brant's kitchen, but once the outside door closed behind him, he didn't know how to get out.
And that's when the demolition party began.
"He lifted the floor panels, tore off window frames, scratched out the kitchen door, pottied all over," Brant said. "He did $20,000 worth of damage."
The bear finally managed to break a small side window and crawl out back into the woods.
The family's dog slept through it all.
Bear visits aren't a surprise to the Brants, Patti said.
"Several years ago, bears got into the fridge and took the ice cream," Ed Brant said. "They ate it right outside and left the container."
On other occasions, he would spot bears near his workshop or trying to pull trash out of the "dipsy Dumpster."
Bears usually stay away from humans and are easily shooed away.
"I don't worry about them except for the damage," he said.
Brant has a small pond on the north side of his property, which he thinks bears stop by when they get thirsty. He also attributes their more frequent visits to a lack of natural food resources.
"It's been very dry," he said. "Berry trees have all dried up."
Brant has consulted state's Department of Fish and Game about the ways to get rid of the bear, but it looks like the unwelcomed visitor is there to stay.
"They said `We have so many bears and we take them out (relocate) periodically, but there is always another one right back in line,"' Brant said.
Hwy39,Glendora Mountain Road,Glendora Ridge Road
http://glendoramtnroad.blogspot.com/
"The road(GMR) from mile marker 14.00 to 9.45 has some large patches of dust like sand. As vehicles travel through the silt, dust clouds shroud the visibility. Beyond mile marker 9.06 in the dead zone, rocks are free to fall from the hillside since the vegetation no longer keeps them bound."
Hwy39(but for now..." 1-WAY CONTROLLED TRAFFIC FROM 11.5 MI SOUTH TO 0.5 MI SOUTH OF THE
COLDBROOK RANGER STATION (LOS ANGELES CO) FROM 0700 HRS TO 1800 HRS 7 DAYS A
WEEK THRU 10/15/09 - DUE TO EMERGENCY REPAIRS ")
Navy plans to remove some, but not all contamination from Morris Dam
http://www.whittierdailynews.com/news/ci_13485814
"For 50 years the waters behind Morris Dam were used to test Navy torpedoes. Now the Navy is dealing with the environmental costs of that top secret operation. Arsenic, perchlorate and other contaminants are all that remain from the 20-acre Navy facilities that occupied a peninsula in middle of the reservoir. Navy operations there ceased in 1993...."
Woman's body recovered from wreck near Morris Dam
http://www.sgvtribune.com/news/ci_13473115
"ANGELES NATIONAL FOREST - Search and rescue divers in Morris Dam Friday recovered the body of a woman who may have driven off the side of Highway 39, officials said.
The woman, who was not identified, was still wearing her seatbelt in the driver's seat of a vehicle that appeared to be a Ford when she was pulled from the wreck, officials said."
After a Devastating Fire, an Intense Study of Its Effects
Photo: West Fork San Gabriel river west of Cogswell dam
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/03...03fire.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
"A multiagency team of state and federal forest and wildlife representatives removed a colony of mountain yellow-legged tadpoles, endangered in Southern California, from a tributary of the San Gabriel River before rock and debris unleashed by fall and winter rains imperil their creekside habitat......Already, scientists have found that ash particles in the streams can shred the fish’s gills and drive up the water’s alkalinity, possibly affecting reproduction and setting the stage for die-offs"
Pasadena's Hernandez back to playing football after death of a friend
http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/ci_13459009
"After enjoying the hilltop views(Eaton Canyon-Razorback ridge area) and fresh air, Hernandez and Beristain headed down.
"I noticed we were going straight down instead of zigzagging like we were supposed to," Hernandez said.
The dirt wasn't stable. Rocks were rolling down. Beristain, about seven feet ahead of Hernandez, slipped and started sliding down ... and sliding fast. Hernandez grabbed onto a twig and called to his friend.
"Artu ... " But Beristain was gone. He'd fallen about 200 feet to his death.
Hernandez remembers sprinting down the hill looking for his friend.
"But looking back, I don't think I could have sprinted," he said. "It was just too steep."
But that's what he remembers, sprinting to save his friend. Hernandez found him, hunched over a tree, his blue polo shirt soaked in blood.
Hernandez held Beristain in his arms, begged him to wake up.
Nothing. "
"I noticed we were going straight down instead of zigzagging like we were supposed to," Hernandez said.
The dirt wasn't stable. Rocks were rolling down. Beristain, about seven feet ahead of Hernandez, slipped and started sliding down ... and sliding fast. Hernandez grabbed onto a twig and called to his friend.
"Artu ... " But Beristain was gone. He'd fallen about 200 feet to his death.
Cutting switchbacks = DEATH _________________ I'm aware that, for many people, a map holds neither meaning nor mystery. I can only hope, compassionately, that the rest of their existence isn't equally poverty-stricken.
- Colin Fletcher
The woman, who was not identified, was still wearing her seatbelt in the driver's seat of a vehicle that appeared to be a Ford when she was pulled from the wreck, officials said."
The woman, who was not identified, was still wearing her seatbelt in the driver's seat of a vehicle that appeared to be a Ford when she was pulled from the wreck, officials said."
Still?
She was identified as Katrina Elias, dying of blunt force trauma. So looks like she died before hitting the water...time of day not factually stated, but CBS had said it was at night..so Hwy39 at night, fast speeds..hmm....
Rancho Cucamonga ups the cost of parking tickets
http://www.dailybulletin.com/ci_13517150
"The city voted to change the parking ticket fees, or the parking enforcement schedule, from $30 to $50 on most tickets.....The city approved its first such district on Wednesday in a neighborhood near the mouth of Cucamonga Canyon, where residents say the streets have been inundated by visitors to the nearby creek.
To ease the problem, the city is creating parking spaces along Almond Street in addition to approving the permit parking system on the streets of Skyline Road, Inspiration Drive, Crestview Place and Crestview Court. Only residents and their guests with the proper stickers will be allowed to park on the aforementioned streets at all times..... "
Resorts ready for busy winter season
http://www.lacanadaonline.com/art...0/15/news/lnws-highway-101509.txt
"Kelly Markham, a public information officer for Caltrans, said Wednesday that Angeles Crest Highway is scheduled to be reopened in early November. ...The rainstorm this week caused some minor erosion, she noted, but not enough to delay the reopening of the highway."
Note: There were some misleading news reports that some of the closed roads had reopened ..not to thru traffic yet though of course.
Historical:Mystery History -- Solved(Hahamongna Watershed Park - Arroyo Seco)
http://pasadenapio.blogspot.com/2009/10/mystery-history-solved_15.html
"Benjamin Eaton named the gorge Devil’s Gate because of the stone formation that looked like a devil's profile, right down to the horns.
Eaton, a visionary engineer and later a district attorney and judge, was a founding resident of the Indiana Colony who designed pipelines between 1865 and 1874 that brought water southward from Devil’s Gate and the canyon now named after him, making possible the eventual development of Pasadena"
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..not to thru traffic yet though of course.