Posted by: ukiahhome | July 18, 2008

100% Contained, but Smoky

CalFire reports 100% containment of Mendocino Fires today with a burn total of 54,800 acres (85 square miles, 22000 hectares). Let’s hope it stays there.

Smoke in Ukiah and Redwood Valley became worse today compared to yesterday. There’s still one new slowly growing fire a few miles north of Potter Valley (it sure doesn’t look fully contained).

Also, Yolla Bolly Middle Eel wilderness (northern part of Mendocino National Forest, 50 miles north of Ukiah) is still self destructing. It appears to be ripping through the wilderness area. See my earlier Yolla Bolly fires blog for details.

Interestingly, this evening we finally saw a number of fire bombers (four) flying out of Ukiah. In prior weeks, we’ve seen very little airplane activity. Today, the planes were headed directly northbound… and had fairly short roundtrips. Either there’s some new fire activity, or they’re pounding that fire north of Potter Valley.

Posted in Mendocino, fires | Tags: , , ,

« Smoke is back…
And the smoke goes on… »

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SUSTAINABLE FORESTS

Sustainability is one of the more popular buzz words today. Our communities must be sustainable. Our lifestyle must be sustainable.

No doubt we all realize that allowing our overgrown forests & the wildlife in them to be incinerated by unnatural Wildfires is not sustainable. Massive efforts by fire fighters on the California Sequoia Piute Fire have achieved a mere 28% containment at a cost of over $23,000,000 while 37,026 acres have been devastated, according to a 7/17/08 Forest Report. Is bankrupting ourselves sustainable?

Let’s all consider most of our forests are ripe for unnatural Wildfires like the Piute Fire. Over 1400 other unnatural Wildfires have burned over 700,000 acres this month in California alone at an estimated cost of over $500,000,000. This was predicted to happen by forest mangers & could have been prevented though active forest management to reduce fuel loads. Yes that will mean many trees will need to be cut down to thin the forest to natural density & a vocal minority abhor the idea of logging. We are seeing the results of their misguided lawsuits blocking forest management & it is destroying our forests, wildlife & air quality, while bankrupting us.

There was a time not too long ago when timber receipts paid for recreation facilities, as well as promoting forest health, supplying a renewable resource, providing jobs & paying taxes. Now that special interests have virtually eliminated logging, we are told we must “Pay to Play” in forests that look more like lunar landscapes.

Please contact Congressman McCarthy’s office at 661 327-3611 & ask him to help us stop the destruction of our forests by supporting active forest management to make them sustainable.
You can read more at http://www.StewardsOfTheSequoia.org/ForestFacts-WildfireFacts.html

Chris Horgan
Executive Director
Stewards of the Sequoia
Division of CTUC 501c3

By: Chris Horgan on July 20, 2008
at 10:08 am

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