Take a look at the Drudge report picture: Drudgereport

That picture is wild. Looks pretty serious.

-- Maya (Maya@eck.ist), May 11, 2000

Answers

That link did not work. It is drudgereport.com

I put the wrong address in there, sorry. I saved that story to read it later.

-- Maya (Maya@eck.ist), May 11, 2000.

Other news sources about the fire:

The Los Alamos Monitor Online
The Cerro Grande Fire, seen here from Will FoxUs Beechcraft Bonanza, looked less threatening Monday evening than it did Sunday and earlier Monday. This photo shows how close to Los Alamos National Laboratory the fire was burning. The fire has not come as close to residences, although Western Area and Royal Crest remained evacuated this morning.

http://losalamos.org/mesa top/fire.htm (Los Alamos Community Pages).

http://www.abqjournal.com/
Most recent update, May 11 5:09 pm:
Cerro Grande Fire Rages On -- Driven by swirling wind of up to 45 mph, the Cerro Grande fire rolled from block to block in abandoned Los Alamos today, burning scores of homes. Meanwhile, the superintendent of Bandelier National Monument was placed on leave. ...

-- (y@x.x), May 11, 2000.

Very serious indeed, Maya. Here's a full article from ABQjournal (last link given above.) There's also a slide-show on that link.

Cerro Grande Fire Rages On

By Chris Roberts The Associated Press LOS ALAMOS  Driven by swirling wind of up to 60 mph, the Cerro Grande fire rolled from block to block in abandoned Los Alamos today, burning scores of homes down to their foundations and rolling over explosives bunkers in the town where the atomic bomb was built.

Firefighters rushed to save houses as flames and billowing smoke rose over the town. Whole neighborhoods were reduced to smoking ruins, with everything from trailers to mansions going up in smoke in a fire that was deliberately set to burn brush at Bandelier National Monument.

Park Superintendent Roy Weaver was placed on administrative leave today pending an investigation. Fire spokesman Juan Rios said the number of evacuees increased to 20,000 to 25,000 people today, including residents of the Espanola Valley northeast of Los Alamos and Abiquiu Grant township north of Los Alamos.

The wildfire first reached Los Alamos on Wednesday  forcing the evacuation of the entire town  and exploded in size from 3,700 acres to 18,000 by today, fanned by blowtorch wind so strong it made parked cars sway.

"I can't believe how many homes are gone," said Don Shainin, a fire battalion commander from Albuquerque who came to Los Alamos to help out.

At the lab, flames singed a research building, rolled past concrete bunkers containing explosives, and came within 30 yards of a plutonium storage facility. But lab officials insisted that dangerous materials were protected in fireproof facilities strong enough to withstand the crash of a 747.

"We can assure the country and New Mexico that our nuclear materials are safe," said Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, a former New Mexico congressman.

County Manager Joe King estimated that 100 homes burned. Rep. Tom Udall, whose district includes Los Alamos, said federal officials estimated 300 to 400.

Rios said officials believe the 100 is "the low end." They planned an evening update after firefighters are debriefed.

With the fire spreading and thousands of people evacuated from Los Alamos and nearby White Rock, finger-pointing had already begun.

The fire had been set May 4 by the National Park Service to clear brush near Bandelier National Monument, but it raged out of control in the dry, windy conditions. Bandelier's superintendent said he didn't see a special National Weather Service forecast faxed to the park beforehand that said fire-growth conditions were at their highest.

Federal authorities pledged to investigate. "Somebody made a mistake and obviously we have to find out who," Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said as he visited the fire zone. The National Park Service is taking administrative action against the local agency official at the center of a dispute over a wildfire that's swept through Los Alamos.

Weaver, who gave the administrative go-ahead for the fire, was placed on administrative leave with pay pending the outcome of an independent investigation into the fire.

Park Service spokesman Rick Frost said it's not unusual procedure to place an employee on leave while the agency investigates an administrative decision.

Weaver has worked for the Park Service for 33 years, including the past 10 in charge of Bandelier.

A Park Service official from Arizona will step in at least temporarily to oversee Bandelier National Monument. Crews working with hand tools and bulldozers worked feverishly to protect homes by clearing away vegetation and cutting firebreaks ahead of the flames. Helicopters dropped water on the fire, while airplanes bombarded it with pink fire retardant. Los Alamos, 70 miles north of Albuquerque, is essentially a company town for the weapons laboratory, which employs 7,000 people at buildings scattered throughout the city. The town is on a mesa, altitude 7,600 feet.

The fire came out of the Jemez Mountains to the west and moved northeast, torching the west and north sides of the city.

As the sun rose today, brick fireplaces and chimneys were the only things remaining of some homes. A basketball hoop remained intact on one driveway, its net singed but still hanging outside a destroyed house.

On the western edge of town, homes were burned to the ground on a mesa overlooking Los Alamos Canyon. The canyon's towering ponderosa pines could be seen through the scorched shells of homes that had been valued at more than a quarter-million dollars.

About 150 National Guardsmen were called in to keep people out of the evacuated zones and prevent looting. Many of the people forced to evacuate from White Rock today had fled Los Alamos on Wednesday.

Kirk Christensen and his wife had taken in four Los Alamos families this week. But when the fire advanced on White Rock, they had to load their camper and head into a sea of cars crawling down the highway for Santa Fe, where they planned to camp outside a friend's house.

"We weren't ready down here," Christensen said. "We were the refugee center for our friends."

Further complicating the firefighting picture was a 200-acre blaze  possibly sparked by an airplane crash  north of Storrie Lake in northeastern New Mexico, state Forestry Division spokeswoman Terri Wildermuth said.

About 50 firefighters were battling the blaze, and homes were being evacuated, Wildermuth said.

-- (y@x.x), May 11, 2000.

Sort of like those missles that went of course and assorted other events over the last few months- "oops! Gee, sorry, guys...."

-- mike in houston (mmorris67@hotmail.com), May 11, 2000.

the hospital,nursing home & VET-center here,are taking in people from los-alamos,it,s real-bad.PRAY for those poor folk,s.[nieghbors]

-- al-d (dogs@zianet.com), May 11, 2000.

Wait til those nukes start popping. Wow!

-- (nemesis@awol.com), May 11, 2000.

It seems another sphere, doesn't it? But it isn't. These are your neighbors. 8K last figure I heard, driven from their homes, sleeping whereever they could find. I was a "Floyd" evacutee, you had to be there, type of thing.

-- My Story (andi@sticking.com), May 12, 2000.

Yes, that was a stupid remark. I hope those people are home again soon and that no deaths occur. None have died yet as far as I know.

-- (nemesis@awol.com), May 12, 2000.

Nukes aren't heat-activated and those buildings are thick concrete, so I doubt there's much to be concerned about there. They have the more fundamental concern that this fire shows few signs of coming under control. Pretty serious error in judgment: starting a controlled burn when conditions could suddenly turn dangerously windy.

I heard on the radio that almost the same problem has now occurred near the Grand Canyon, but fortunately there are few if any homes at risk. Someone needs to tell the Forest Service (or whoever is setting these "burns") to stand the heck down until the winds quiet for a bit.

-- DeeEmBee (macbeth1@pacbell.net), May 12, 2000.

The latest news is that the area that has been burning near Los Alamos National Laboratory has been used for above-ground nuclear testing, and that the fire is now producing radioactive fallout.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), May 12, 2000.

Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos: The Fire Hazards they're NOT Discussing Snip In support of the Laboratory's mission, the Environmental Management program is also investigating approximately 2,100 sites to determine if cleanup is needed. These sites range in size from less than 1 square meter to tens of hectares (a few square feet to tens of acres). Potential residual contamination may exist at these sites as the result of 50 years of Laboratory operation. Contaminants may include radionuclides, organic solvents, metals, and high explosives. Residual contamination may exist in more than 7 million cubic meters (9.1 million cubic yards) of environmental media, primarily soils and sediments.

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), May 12, 2000.

Hey there everyone, thanks for the extra links and information. I hope they get this under control.

-- Maya (Maya@eck.ist), May 12, 2000.

Got weiners?

-- Porky (Porky@in.cellblockD), May 12, 2000.

Update:

Friday, May 12, 2000

'Real Optimism This Morning'

By Michelle Koidin The Associated Press LOS ALAMOS  Falling wind speeds and increased humidity today gave firefighters a boost as they struggled to hold the line against a fire that had burned 280 homes and brought devastation akin to war to the town where the atomic bomb was built. "Some real optimism this morning," Gov. Gary Johnson said on NBC's "Today" show this morning. "Of course this has been out of control for a couple of days and with the light winds, we're hoping to get air power in here today to put it out. There haven't been any new fires so this is really positive. Nobody's been hurt throughout this whole catastrophe." Full article

-- (y@x.x), May 12, 2000.

Warning--I'm going to get on my soapbox for a while, so if you don't want to hear my opinion on government hypocracy, pass on to the next post.

I used to work for the US Forest Service (Siskiyou NF, in Oregon), in the field of hydrology. Among MANY other ridiculous practices I encountered there is the utter refusal by the powers that be to curtail the TRADITION of burning slash.

Here in Oregon, we are often harassed by other government agencies for using wood to heat our homes. Yet the Forest Service, State Forestry, County Forestry, and Bureau of Mismanagement (oops, make that Bureau of Land Management) continue with the barbaric and destructive practice of burning millions of acres of land every year. This results in the loss of nutrients for the growth of the very trees they are alegedly trying to grow, the loss of duff (the partially decomposed organic layer which protects the soil from the erosive force of raindrops and water flowing across the ground), and results in the necessity of planting new baby trees wherever this technique is used. In many forests the use of fire also stimulates the growth of "weed" species, as these agencies call any plant without current commercial value; herbicide is often used a year or two after the "weed species" start growing, because they stunt or kill the commercial tree species.

In addition, these fires contribute huge quantities of particulates and poisonous gases to our already troubled atmosphere. Not to mention all the CO2, that malevolent greenhouse gas.

And for what? I can't ever get any logical reasons from the various agencies. The only credible explanation is that it is cheaper than a technique called "lop and scatter", where the slash is cut up enough to lie down fairly close to the ground so that it will decompose and continue providing all the aforementioned benefits to the soil (and wildlife).

Since the government is trying to keep the air clean by requiring many of us to use electricity or oil or gas, etc to heat our homes (although these power sources are usually produced by fossil fuels, and as such seem much more harmful than an efficient woodstove, at least in rural areas, they still burn, burn, burn all their slash, producing NO home heating, water heating, or other use for the heat given off.

I have personally tried to get these agencies to utilize a chipper to grind up the slash, so that it will become a soil amendment, rather than a nuisance, but so far, to no avail. There are some private timber owners who utilize them, but I know of no governtment agency which does so.

They claim it is too expensive to get the manpower to load the slash into the chipper. But out of the other side of their mouths, they constantly lament all the loss of "jobs" which is happening all over the country. Weird.

If anyone wants to help me put an end to this practice, please take a few minutes to write an email or a letter to the government agency of your choice. Also, letters to the editor of your local newspaper, or other newspapers, can be effective, if enough of us write the letters.

How about signing off this forum a few minutes early, and do something really positive to help our environment?

Thanks for listening. Please help.

JOJ

-- jumpoff joe (jumpoff@echoweb.neet), May 14, 2000.

Great post, JOJ. Thanks!!!

-- Observer (observer@lots.to.observe), May 14, 2000.

Jumpoff,

Thank you for the excellent post. Your hypothoses seem to answer quite a few problems. However, I do have one concern though about your opinion on grinding up the "slash": Wouldn't the end product, mulch, end up being a higher risk "fire hazard" than the original slash would be? Seems to me that the slash/mulch would dry out faster than whole logs and with the shredded wood fibres being exposed, *much* easier to ignite.

The point might be mute, say in Western Oregon, in the rainforests where the mulch would decay before it would dry out. However, IMO, in dryer climes mulching would be more of a hazard than a benefit.

One other question: How much greenhouse gases are created by decaying matter? Over short-term, would fires or decaying matter contribute more to the greenhouse effect?

-- Deb M. (vmcclell@columbus.rr.com), May 14, 2000.

Great post Joe! This really makes sense and gives me a lot to think about. Many thank U's.

-- Maya (Maya@eck.ist), May 14, 2000.

Hey joe,

I'm gonna split hairs with you a wee bit.

I think you're painting with a a big ol' broad brush when you comment on the:

"barbaric and destructive practice of burning millions of acres of land every year."

Prescribed burns in my area are [were] done after the first fall rain, they were run through quickly to take down the underbrush and open up closed cones. Ideally they didn't have a debilitating effect on mature trees, but 'recycled' nutrients into available forms for new growth. These ecosytems use fire effectively in their natural cycles, but we've had a policy of fire suppression for so long that the fuel loads have built up to dangerously high levels.

"They claim it is too expensive to get the manpower to load the slash into the chipper."

I've seen prison labor used on occasion to handle this kind of an operation. Maybe it's a workable suggestion for your area.

-- flora (***@__._), May 14, 2000.

"They claim it is too expensive to get the manpower to load the slash into the chipper. But out of the other side of their mouths, they constantly lament all the loss of "jobs" which is happening all over the country. Weird."

With the money that we are going to spend to rebuild the lives of the victims of this stupid fire ($billions), we could have put tens of thousands to work for a life time renewing the forests instead of burning them.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), May 14, 2000.