A Surprisingly Bullish Toro Fire

Today being November 8th I was lulled into a sense of the annual local fire season being over and even allowed my beloved mobile scanner's rechargeable batteries to go dead. I ended up regretting that given a wildland fire (Toro Incident) started this morning. This fire was a result of an ATV accident in the hills north of Highway 41 in the area of Toro Creek Road in an area locals call "Halfway Station". It burned about 51 acres of oak woodland and chaparral with surprising vigor given how late in the year it is and how unusual this sort of activity is around here this time of year. Further south in California Santa Ana Wind-driven fires are not entirely unusual in November although rarer than in October and September. This fuel-driven and slope-driven wildfire benefited from the current historically dry fuels along with a light offshore wind. I drove out to the fire en route to working in Atascadero and capture the images below.
Note: be sure to check out the aerial images of this fire taken by Toro Air Attack (Air Attack 340) HERE. 

All photos by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).