Sunday, April 27, 2008

We had a long sleepless night yesterday. A huge wild fire broke out in the afternoon and continued through the night one canyon east of R's cabin. Luckily we have the wind (or lack thereof) in our favor and it's very slow moving. Hundreds of houses close to us were evacuated, but we have been lucky.

The helicopters and planes that drop the water don't fly after dusk, so the night is always a different story. Yesterday afternoon it did not look so bad, and then in the night it flared up and now half of the mountain was charred and the fire has jumped the canyon. The helicopters started up again at dawn and this was the sunrise. Full of smoke and dark.

The fire is still not out, but it looks very well contained from where we are. Fingers crossed the wind stays down tonight again.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good luck. We have so many fires here in Cape Town South Africa so I know how scary it is when it is nearby. We have had a particularly bad summer this year and as far as you can see at the moment, the mountains are all burnt. Quite sad but necessary for our indigenous plants to survive...but I still cry for the poor tortoises and other buck that cannot escape it. I hate fires - they are both beautiful and awful at the same time.

Debi van Zyl said...

thanks for the good wishes... and you're right, it is so necessary to have this happen. in fact one of the reasons why the fire is so bad is because this area hasn't burned in about 40 years. fire is definitely needed to keep things in check. Sorry to hear that Cape Town has had a bad summer.I too feel for all the animals that can't make it out. But like you said, fires are beautiful and awful, part of the cycle.