Highway 41 Fire Student Documentary

On August 14, 2019, I had lunch in San Luis Obispo with my 7th grade history teacher Mike Burrell. He was my favorite teacher at Atascadero Junior High School (now Atascadero Middle School) when I was there 1983-1985. En route there from my home in Paso Robles it felt odd to me driving southbound on Highway 101 through the former Highway 41 Fire burn area. It was 25 years to the day after it started and that area would burn the next day. My drive included the area adjacent to Santa Margarita Ranch where the fire jumped the highway as a massive 100 foot wide fire tornado. It also included the entrance to Tassajara Canyon which experienced area ignition conditions when the fire roared through. And lastly, it included Cuesta Grade which was charred entirely, top to bottom, north and south sides of Cuesta Summit.

During lunch I brought this up with Mike and he informed me that in 1995, the year following the Highway 41 Fire, at which point he was then working at Oak Hills High School in Atascadero, he had his students put together a student documentary about the fire. After creating it they burned it on to blank VHS cassettes and sold them for $10 each for a fundraising drive.  After lunch I visited his home in SLO for the first time as we were reconnecting after all these years. Heretofore we merely briefly chatted on Facebook from time to time. Mike gave me the grand tour of his library/museum/arboretum/home which was a lot of fun. Before I left he handed me the only extant version of the documentary on disk. I asked him if I could burn some copies and donate them as well as upload the documentary to Youtube to which Mike generously accented.

Back in Paso Robles I took this disk to The Blueprinter and they directed me to Gallagher Video Services in town. I made an appointment and met with Ron Gallagher and told him my expectations. I wanted several copies of this documentary burned and I wanted nice graphic design for them that was apropos in labeling the product and I wanted an mp4 copy of it burned onto a flash drive so I could upload it to Youtube. I did this last week and today it was ready and here you go. At top is the documentary on Youtube. In the middle is the old disk and directly above is a copy of the new disk version produced by Ron Gallagher. Nicely done I think.

Mike also handed me a photocopy of an old SLO Tribune article from 1995 which recounts the story of this documentary. Read it above and if need be zoom in closer so the print is legible.

Picture of the Day - McMillan Fire Aerial View

In closing out my discussion of my unexpectedly exciting chase of the 1,764-acre McMillan Fire a few days ago, above is an aerial image of the entire fire area as viewed from Air Attack 340 out of Paso Robles Air Attack Base. At bottom left is the roadside rest area along Highway 46 from which I shot half of my video and still images. Photo by Cal Fire (all rights reserved).

More of My McMillan Fire Footage on Media

Upon awaking this morning and checking online, to my surprise my footage of the 1,764-acre McMillan Fire yesterday had spread across various media sources beyond just AccuWeather last night. This is my first experience with this and I'm getting a small kick out of it. I do not regret giving a few news video gathering organization permission to use my stuff for free. There was nothing special about this fire to be quite honest. If I ever capture something pretty awesome then I will demand money. Below are the versions of my video that appeared today on ABC News, Pattrn, and WeatherNation. Check HERE to see my footage on AccuWeather last night.

McMillan Fire Photos

Today while working at my house in Paso Robles, I espied a loom-up of smoke off to the east. I immediately stopped what I was doing and turned on my scanner and checked Twitter and heard and saw references to "McMillan". This told me that the fire was in the area of Hwy 46 and McMillan Canyon Road in the Shandon area. I then without much pre-planning (I neglected to grab water which I later regretted) and headed out the door and out Highway 46 east towards the fire. Below are some of the images I captured shown in order of the incident known as the McMillan Fire. Unfortunately, I didn't realize the camera on my iPhone8 was not set to Auto so some of these images aren't as clear as they should be... sorry! Tomorrow I will see about sharing some of the video shorts I captured. *Update: final acreage was mapped at 1,764 acres.

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

Picture of the Day - CAL FIRE Aerodrome

I found this Google Earth image on Twitter tonight. It shows numerous CAL FIRE aerial assets parked on the tarmac at an unidentified airfield. In this image we see six of CALFIRE's 23 Grumman S-2T 1,200 gallon airtankers and 10 of its 14 OV-10A airtactical aircraft (air attack planes).
Image courtesy of Google Earth (all rights reserved).

Alamo Fire Chase

This afternoon the Alamo Fire, which began in southern San Luis Obispo County yesterday afternoon just north of Highway 166 near Alamo Canyon Road, exploded in the triple digit heat making a run southwards at Highway 166 for the second day in a row. This time it successfully got established south of the highway connecting Bakersfield and Santa Maria and ran amok in the ridges and flats in the vicinity of Twitchell Reservoir. In just a few hours it jumped from 250 acres to 3,400 acres.

This view is from a parking lot adjacent to southbound Highway 101 at the south Spring Street on-ramp looking southeast from Paso Robles, CA. At this point I was en route to meet up with mom and go hunt this fire and see how close we could get and perhaps get some interesting images of it. Note the pyrocumulus cloud atop the main convection column.

This was the view southward from the southern end of the Huasna Valley as mom and I sought to get in as close to this fire as possible. A couple of miles later we turned around at a gate on Huasna River Road.

On the drive into Huasna Valley we encountered several horse trailers filled with horses rapidly been driven out of the valley headed westward with grim faces

On the drive home we encountered a fair amount of radio traffic regarding a "Tower Incident." Given how crummy the radio and cell signal strength is out in Huasana Valley and environs we had missed the initial response to a new serious fire back closer to home atop the Cuesta Grade as started by a car fire on the northbound side of Highway 101.

We passed the Tower Fire on the drive home. The traffic backup on the northbound side of Highway 101 was actually a nightmarish crawl from San Luis Obispo to the top of the grade where the causal car fire was located. By the time we actually got to the fire almost an hour after first entering the queue the fire was pretty much done. I'm still not entirely sure why CAL FIRE needed to close down two of three lanes instead of one of three lanes. 

Here is the causal crispy car that started it all with the CAL FIRE prevention officer busy  investigating why the car caught fire. The Tower Fire started explosively but rapidly lost steam when once its own convection column blocked out the sun and plunged the fire area into a rather dark overcast. The fire burned 58 acres per the air attack.

The smoke from the Alamo Fire veered northwestward and northward from the fire contrary to the predicted Sundowner Winds tonight. This created an ominous smoky sunset over the North County. I shot this image from the northbound Highway 101 park & ride at Curbaril Avenue in Atascadero. All images by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).
*NOTE: to view a professionally-photographed image of today's fire action go HERE.

Canyon Fire Entrapment

I quite distinctly remember the Canyon Fire on the post of Vandenberg AFB last year for a number of reasons. These reasons include the fact it started and largely burned in Honda Canyon, the namesake of another fire there in 1977 which, driven by Santa Ana Winds, killed four people including the base commander and base fire chief. Read more about it HERE. I also remember last year's fire because it delayed the launch of  WorldView-4 earth observation satellite from the base's space launch complex. I also remember it for the fact it seemed to generate some of the most awesometacular pyrocumulus clouds seen on a wildfire on the Central Coast since the 1993 Marre Fire which also featured a firefighter entrapment incident sans casualties. There was even a memorable fire-related but not fire-caused fatality as Ventura County Fire Department engineer Ryan Osler was killed in the rollover of a VCFD water tender en route to the fire traveling on Highway 246 near Lompoc, CA. However, I only vaguely remember there was an entrapment situation on the Canyon Fire last year which caused some injuries but no deaths but was certainly a close call. Today I noticed a link to this on Twitter which appears to have been published a few weeks ago. This short video makes for a quite compelling post-incident analysis with some rather dramatic wildfire videography.

Picture of the Day - Crash 10

Today I worked a 100-person wedding at Santa Margarita Ranch for the first time in longer than I can remember. I noticed early on that Rob Rossi appears to have added a new piece to his growing collection of electic and esoteric old equipment stored on the property. How airfield crash truck from Fort Wainright ended up in Santa Margarita is beyond my capacity to know at this point. I do note the tires are in excellent condition including at least one new tire.

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

Picture of the Day - VLAT B-Lining To Barn

Today into tonight I worked a shift at a wedding at Avila Beach Golf Resort. During the daylight portion of the event there was an endless parade of firefighting aircraft passing to and fro between the Los Padres National Forest's Santa Maria Air Attack Base and the Soberanes Fire on the Monterey District of the forest. This included two VLATs (Very Large Air Tankers) which must use Santa Maria as CAL FIRE's Paso Robles Air Attack Base's runway is too short for the DC-10s. The activity level was up from recent norms with the fire blowing up today as temperatures rose and an offshore wind conspired to push the fire harder. By tonight, new evacuation warnings have been issued for Arroyo Seco Road and East Carmel Valley Road west of Greenfield, CA. I watched both VLATs fly over my location this evening en route "back to the barn" for the night in Santa Maria. I captured the image above of the last one of the two to pass over me. Photo by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).

Picture of the Day - Chimney Fire-Related Pics

Last week I captured these two images with the intent of posting them as Pics of the Day here on this blog. However, last week life got interrupted and that never worked out, but better late than never.

Last Wednesday evening I was on the Cal Poly campus and these two Type-3 engines from Cal Fire's San Bernardino Unit. They were on the Cal Poly campus as the campus has been housing some Chimney Fire overflow from the North County.

Last Thursday afternoon as I headed out to my spiritual father's house for a decompression session, I found myself behind this KSBY-TV van as I pulled onto 24th Street from Riverside Street where the Chimney Fire command post is located on the Mid-State Fairgrounds. Both images by Kim Patrick Noyes (all rights reserved).

Most Awesome Tanker Drop Ever

I first viewed this video yesterday on Facebook which is the only social networking site in which it has appeared as far as I know. The videographer known only as "808" captured this emergency drop on a Santa Clarita Valley area neighborhood in Sand Canyon under direct and eminent threat from the Sand Fire on either Saturday afternoon, July 23, or Sunday afternoon, July 24, 2016, Days Two or Three of the incident when it was burning homes and killing people. In my opinion this is the very best tanker drop footage yet captured anywhere at any time. Aside from capturing the urgency of the situation, it is very close to the action, shows the entire process of a drop including the lead plane directing the tanker along its path and where to start the drop, shows a DC-10 supertanker, and despite being taken with a smart phone, it is steadily held and well-framed videography. Enjoy!

Cuesta Fire - Day Three

Today I drove down to see the 2500-acre Cuesta Fire once again with mom. She drove and I rode along so I could snap some images. We took Highway 101 down to Monterey Street in San Luis Obispo and turned around and came back up the grade. It was still interesting on that side today, but much less is going on as most firefighting apparatus and resources that were there yesterday have moved on and there were no visible flames.

On the Santa Margarita side of the Santa Lucia Mountains (we pulled off of the 101 and onto Highway 58) it was a different story. There was much activity as fire and law enforcement personnel (there to help with evacuations and protecting vacant properties) coming and going. We headed out of town on Highway 58 and proceeded out into the Rinconada Valley on Pozo Road and saw some fairly interesting smoke activity and fire activity from a distance sans any visible flames due to terrain and smoke obscuring our view. The following images are shown in the order I captured them.

*Note: some of my images again today feature an annoying flaw much like yesterday. I have a scratched lens and thought it was caused by that. Tonight while looking inside my camera I realized it was a speck of lint which I have now removed. Subsequent images should be clean of artifacts.

Southbound US 101 just north of Santa Margarita, CA.

Left flank of the fire stuck in retardant on a ridge of oak woodland overlooking US 101.

Retardant-stained ridgeline adjacent to the northbound side of US 101 just west of Santa Margarita.

Two strike teams of CALFIRE type-3 engines from Monte Vista Unit (San Diego County) staged at the summit of the Cuesta Grade.

Sudden flare-up as viewed from San Luis Obispo at Monterey Steet.

Flare-up just over the ridgeline from the Cuesta Grade with Mt. Lowe Road crossing the face of the slope.

Only one USFS type-3 engine from the Los Padres NF kept an eye out on the grade now that fire activity was minimal to none.

Retardant-stained hillside.

A Bell Huey copter on the Santa Margarita side of the Cuesta Grade.

The aforementioned two strikes teams from San Diego County stated at the top of the Cuesta Grade.

Another Bell Huey helicopter utilizing a bambi bucket.

Air Attack 410 out of Porterville was the only fixed-wing aircraft over the fire during the time we were at the fire. The aircraft is dwarfed by the smoke plume and barely visible here.

I cut off the nose of the OC bird (another Bell Huey)

The smoke here had an odd glow to it that reflected off of Pozo Road here.

Pozo Road in the Rinconada Valley looking back to the west at the fire.

This area last burned variously in the 1985 Las Pilitas Fire and 1994 Highway 41 Fire.

This fire is burning close to where I worked last weekend at Oyster Ridge Ranch near the zip line adventure site.

Smoke obscured our seeing any flames.

This flare-up resulted from a wind change that blasted by us briefly as we watched the fire from Pozo Road.

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