Smoke blankets the valleys. In the high mountains, winds that naturally funnel through the canyons exacerbate the fires already burning, and start new ones. Highway 70, between Truckee and Paradise, is closed from 10 miles west of the Plumas County line (in Nevada) to Greenville, where Highway 89 tees off to the south. This vital artery is nothing but a haze of choking brownish fumes, and those who live along this highway from Beckworth to Blairsden are trapped by the smoke from the Yuba River fire, which has consumed almost 4,000 acres. It looks like a vision from hell, and soot blankets every surface.
North of Yuba City, and south of Salinas - with a breach protecting San Francisco and Sacramento, fire burns and smoke billows. Sometimes abated, more often springing to life again as winds and drier weather breathe new life into this, man's most ancient enemy - fire consumes the days of the nearly 20,000 firefighters, whose grim, smoke-blackened visages reflect the possibility that, this year, fire may finally get the upper hand.
The California Office of Emergency Services reports 330 active fires. As many as 1,400 fires have been contained, thanks to a massive effort by firefighters and a weekend of cooler, wetter weather. President Bush, at the behest of California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, has declared much of California a federal disaster area. This past week, with the National Weather Service predicting temperatures in the 90s and 100s for much of California, the governor has also been forced to activate the state's Excessive Heat Emergency Plan. It couldn't have come at a worse time, with emergency responders and state agencies stretched to the breaking point.
This combination of extreme heat and smoke is especially dangerous to the very young, the old, and those who are ill or have breathing-related problems. Public Health Department staff and volunteers are trying to get the word out to these vulnerable populations, including hospitals, senior care centers and the like. Cooling centers are being operated at state facilities for those who lack air conditioning. Television, radio and Internet news sources are cooperating in the effort, advising residents to drink plenty of water, visit malls, theaters and other public venues to stay cool if they lack home air conditioning, and watch for the signs of heat-related illness, which include fatigue, nausea, headache and vomiting.
Even so, some will be missed. The old man who refused to evacuate around Big Sur, where extreme fire has burned 80,186 acres; the asthmatic living in the High Sierras, independent of television, radio or Internet; the Hispanic children playing in the sandy fields around Watsonville, the artichoke capital of the world - these are the elements of a vast population that may be overlooked in burning hot California, which is beginning to look a lot less like paradise and a lot more like its antithesis.
How did California, the land of golden opportunity and golden dreams, come to this? Forestry policies have had a lot to do with it. California, and much of the West, is a land designed by Nature to experience periodic, cleansing fires. The U.S. Forest Service, in contravention of nature, has in the past regularly extinguished small fires to protect homeowners. The consequences of these actions are vast swathes of land containing highly combustible materials like fir and pine, not to mention chaparral, Manzanita, greasewood and creosote bush, which are generally regarded as weeds. California is known for its sunny skies, and the storms that do arrive are generally lightning storms - spectacular to watch but providing little in the way of rain. This is as true in the mountains as the valleys.
Throwing money at the problem has not done much good. Spending to combat forest fires has risen by $1 billion in the last decade, and the fires are worse than ever. This summer has seen the loss of 265,000 acres, or more than 400 square miles. Clearly, an analysis of how the money is being spent, and finding more effective means of prevention, is needed.
Global warming is another culprit. In 2006, Science Magazine conducted a study and found that the incidence of large wildfires in western forests increased by 400% from 1970 to 1986, and the area burned by these fires was more than six times as great. The length of the wildfire season also increased by 78 days. The Big Sur fire in California got out of control because Sudden Oak Death - a consequence of warming, which has led to more invasive pests - reduced acres of viable oaks to dead tinder waiting for lightning to strike.
Overall, the report suggests that global warming trends are likely to intensify threats to humans and ecosystems, as forests - natural carbon sinks - are converted to more carbon dioxide by burning, and restoration becomes increasingly difficult due to the changing nature of these ecosystems. A recent study from France has already demonstrated that plants move "uphill", or into regions similar to the ones where they evolved, leaving behind nothing but the aforementioned weeds, so replanting after a forest fire may no longer be a viable solution.
We have already been warned, by none other than NASA scientist James Hansen, that we are "toast" unless we get on a different path immediately regarding carbon dioxide emissions from our vehicles, power plants and factories. Perhaps the warning comes too late. It may be that California, the paradise of yesteryear, is fast becoming a hot, smoke-filled, nightmare landscape out of Dante's Inferno - and a fitting symbol of our petroleum-driven society, which has ignored the warning signs for too long and now faces the backlash.
