Speaker 1: You're listen Saints KFI AM six forty the Bill Handles
Speaker 1: show on demand on the iHeartRadio f CAFI Handle Here
Speaker 1: on a very smoky and for the wrong reasons. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: very hot if you're in the fire area day, and
Speaker 1: none of that particularly good news. As I've mentioned that
Speaker 1: this story, this fire story is southern California is not
Speaker 1: only a huge story locally, of course it would be,
Speaker 1: but nationally and internationally. Alex Stone, ABC News correspondent is
Speaker 1: in Altadena and he's reporting both for US and ABC
Speaker 1: what's going on. So Alex, thanks for taking the time there.
Speaker 1: You are in the Altadena fire area. What are you seeing,
Speaker 1: what is going on?
Speaker 2: What are you experiencing?
Speaker 3: Hi, Bill, I'm on Sacramento Street right now, right off
Speaker 3: of Lake Avenue, and there are numerous homes that are
Speaker 3: burning around me here, and really they're burning on checks.
Speaker 3: There is one engine from La County Fire that just
Speaker 3: throw through the area, but there's nothing that they can do.
Speaker 3: It is cars, It is homes burning on this street,
Speaker 3: and it is street after street that really it was
Speaker 3: the winds of about four to five am that where
Speaker 3: we got a reading of one hundred miles an hour
Speaker 3: on one of the peaks around here. But it was
Speaker 3: so strong that when you would get out of your car,
Speaker 3: your car door would actually snap all the way back,
Speaker 3: and it was hard to just stand at that time.
Speaker 3: There were embers flying everywhere, live embers rolling down the street,
Speaker 3: and that has led to what we are seeing right
Speaker 3: now that in this whole area is I'm looking from
Speaker 3: block to block. I can only see that buildings are
Speaker 3: on fire, that they have spread. On the one that
Speaker 3: I'm on right now, there's two or three cars that
Speaker 3: are fully engulfed right now, along with a number of homes,
Speaker 3: and it's silent. I'm the only one standing on this street.
Speaker 3: There's nothing firefighters can do to battle this right now.
Speaker 3: These homes are burning unchecked.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Can you imagine being an owner of one of
Speaker 1: those homes.
Speaker 2: Either being able to watch the home burning.
Speaker 1: Down up close, which I'm assuming is not the case
Speaker 1: because he said the street is empty, or seeing the
Speaker 1: home being burnt and watching a news report and there
Speaker 1: are no firefighters and a fire truck goes right past
Speaker 1: the house. I mean, that is something that we're not
Speaker 1: used to do. They have authorities tell you just where
Speaker 1: to stand. Alex, you're an empty street. Did they say
Speaker 1: you got to stand over there or are you on
Speaker 1: your own?
Speaker 3: They're not here. We're we're on our own in here.
Speaker 3: But what I'm saying is no hit to firefighters. They're
Speaker 3: just out manned right now. There's nothing that one engine
Speaker 3: is going to do.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: I understand that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that are burning to the ground, but yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean this is really a situation of that. With all
Speaker 3: three fires that are burning and the size of this
Speaker 3: one and the size of one of the physical palissy,
Speaker 3: there's nothing that they can do. There are explosions going
Speaker 3: off all over the place NonStop as these buildings are burning,
Speaker 3: and propaane tanks and ammunition and other things are burning
Speaker 3: inside of the homes. But what they have been doing
Speaker 3: is I mean, really this is about life safety right now,
Speaker 3: telling people to get out and just get out of
Speaker 3: the area that the Sheriff's Department has been going through
Speaker 3: on their loud speakers, just saying everybody out there are
Speaker 3: some lookie loose around that have decided that you know,
Speaker 3: they're going to film it rather than go. But the
Speaker 3: Sheriff's bar has just been going up and down Lake
Speaker 3: Avenue here on their loud speakers saying you must leave immediately.
Speaker 3: And so we're seeing a lot of people who are
Speaker 3: packing up and getting out, not like Pacific Palisades yesterday
Speaker 3: with the bumper to bumper trying to get out. The
Speaker 3: streets here are a lot wider, so they're able to
Speaker 3: do it. But the people, since you know, and I
Speaker 3: came into the main area probably around three point thirty
Speaker 3: this morning, people were in a long line trying to
Speaker 3: get out with their packed up vehicles and bailing out
Speaker 3: of the area.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm thinking, you know, how do the firefighters even
Speaker 1: deal with this? Because you've got one home and let's
Speaker 1: say they're fighting a fire and then they're trying to
Speaker 1: do some kind of property preservation and then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, six doors away, a fire just ignites, because
Speaker 1: an ember just ignites a palm tree or a piece
Speaker 1: of brush.
Speaker 2: And are they trying to go back and forth?
Speaker 1: Are they Do you see any fire equipment dealing with
Speaker 1: any fires right now?
Speaker 3: They're trying to stop anything that it sparks up, But
Speaker 3: some of these embers have been jumping, oh, probably half
Speaker 3: a mile to a mile. There were areas this morning
Speaker 3: when the wind was at its worst and there was
Speaker 3: no way at that time, I would have been able
Speaker 3: to talk to you on the phone outside without getting
Speaker 3: into a car, whereas right now I'm standing outside and
Speaker 3: there's really no wind, thank goodness. But when the embers
Speaker 3: were really flying, you would think that you were pretty
Speaker 3: far ahead of the front of the fire, the flaming front,
Speaker 3: and then all of a sudden, embers would land and
Speaker 3: you'd have fire all around you, and it was kind
Speaker 3: of playing hopscotch of jumping ahead and getting out of
Speaker 3: the area. And there were a few times I saw
Speaker 3: firefighters race up and try to put out something before
Speaker 3: it it burned a building. But they're you know, like
Speaker 3: I say, I mean this really right now is about
Speaker 3: trying to rescue people, to get them out, to convince
Speaker 3: them to go. We know they've done a number of
Speaker 3: rescues of elderly people overnight in the winds. It was
Speaker 3: impossible when driving to see five feet in front of
Speaker 3: your car, and on tight streets with fire everywhere, and
Speaker 3: it's always hard at night time to know really where
Speaker 3: the fire is because you can only see this glow.
Speaker 3: So they were working on getting people out. Now as
Speaker 3: I talk to you right now, it's like they're listening
Speaker 3: to KFI. There's a strike team pulling up to this
Speaker 3: neighborhood with a number of fire engines. They're pulling up
Speaker 3: to one of the high prints as well. It looks
Speaker 3: like they may try to battle back some of these
Speaker 3: flames that are burning these homes. I mean, these homes
Speaker 3: are really going up right now. And well now it
Speaker 3: looks like maybe not that there's not a lot they
Speaker 3: can do, and they're gonna driven, but they're kind of
Speaker 3: keeping an eye on it to know where the flames
Speaker 3: are to try to stop them from progressing now that
Speaker 3: the wind has died down, But for these homes, there's
Speaker 3: nothing that they can do.
Speaker 1: Do you see any aircraft dealing with the fire yet?
Speaker 1: Daytime winds are down, they should be up.
Speaker 3: Sorry, Bill, I was clearing hopefully you couldn't hear that
Speaker 3: clearing an emergency alert that was going off on my phone.
Speaker 1: No, well you have that, Okay, let me restated. Now
Speaker 1: that the winds have died down and it's light, we
Speaker 1: have daybreak. Do you see any air assets up that
Speaker 1: you're looking at.
Speaker 3: No, I haven't heard any air assets. I haven't seen
Speaker 3: any air assets. I'm guessing the wind probably at altitude
Speaker 3: is still pretty strong. The problem they were having last
Speaker 3: night is they hit the ground. Even the helicopters that
Speaker 3: were able to fly in pretty strong winds yesterday, not
Speaker 3: only because of the safety of the helicopters, but the
Speaker 3: drops weren't doing any good. When they would drop water,
Speaker 3: it would just fly off at a ninety degree angle
Speaker 3: and wasn't hitting the ground. What is It's so dry
Speaker 3: that evaporates very quickly, but two in the wind, it
Speaker 3: just makes a right hand turn and goes off into
Speaker 3: the air and doesn't do any good. Did they Hopefully
Speaker 3: the wind stays like it is right now and if
Speaker 3: they if it's this way up a little bit at altitude,
Speaker 3: that they'll be able there to try to get aircraft
Speaker 3: back up at least the helicopters to begin. I mean,
Speaker 3: they could just dump on some of these homes and
Speaker 3: it would put out a lot of this fire to
Speaker 3: just prevent it from continuing to move down. Altadena, Alex,
Speaker 3: thank you.
Speaker 1: I'm sure we're going to get back to you as
Speaker 1: you're reporting on this fire over the next I assume
Speaker 1: you've been up all night and you probably not going
Speaker 1: to get any sleep for.
Speaker 3: A while, so.
Speaker 2: Enjoy yourself.
Speaker 1: I guess all right, Michael Monks kfi's Michael Monks is
Speaker 1: at the Westwood Recreational Center.
Speaker 2: Do I have that right, Michael?
Speaker 3: You do? Bill.
Speaker 4: This is one of these centers that's been set up
Speaker 4: for people who have evacuated from the fire in the Palisades.
Speaker 4: And I can tell you that just right here in
Speaker 4: this small piece of the world, the sky above is
Speaker 4: quite a group. You got a significant contrast. There's blue
Speaker 4: skies to my right, beautiful California sky, and then to
Speaker 4: my left it's dark, gray, cloudy, smoky. The wind is blowing.
Speaker 4: It feels ominous, It almost feels funereal.
Speaker 3: Here.
Speaker 4: There is certainly a ghastly pallor that's hanging over people
Speaker 4: here as they wonder what may be left of their
Speaker 4: homes or what's still left to come in the Palisades.
Speaker 4: And I can tell you this feels a lot different
Speaker 4: than the evacuation center I visited not that long ago
Speaker 4: when Malibu was burning, where people did show up for
Speaker 4: a little while, but there was a lot of optimism
Speaker 4: that this is going to pass and we'll be going
Speaker 4: back home. This one definitely has more of a sense
Speaker 4: of dread.
Speaker 2: And concern how many people are there.
Speaker 4: I could not get a specific account from the fire
Speaker 4: department that's here operating this shelter, but there are dozens.
Speaker 4: And there are folks who are sleeping. So they have
Speaker 4: a gym here, and that gym is currently closed unless
Speaker 4: you're going in there to sleep. So they've got all
Speaker 4: the cots set up, and there are definitely people sleeping
Speaker 4: in there. A lot of cars are here, and I'm
Speaker 4: also seeing a lot of seniors, a lot of folks
Speaker 4: using walkers, using wheelchairs. There are a lot of pet
Speaker 4: owners here, so people are with their pets. So people
Speaker 4: are with their pets, they're walking their dogs. And I
Speaker 4: did speak to a guy who was here. He came
Speaker 4: down from the palisades. He was waiting it out at first,
Speaker 4: he said, until about four o'clock yesterday afternoon. It wasn't
Speaker 4: the you know, the lapping of the flames that pushed
Speaker 4: him out. It was simply the air quality. When he thought,
Speaker 4: I've got to get going, Plus the traffic that was
Speaker 4: starting to build on the roads. I mean, if you
Speaker 4: live there, you can see it building. He said, I'd
Speaker 4: better get in that line right now before he gets worse,
Speaker 4: and said he made it out just before that clog
Speaker 4: from all the cars that had to be left behind.
Speaker 4: So he's not sure what's going on in his neighborhood.
Speaker 4: And you know, we know the firefighters are there doing
Speaker 4: their best, but it's it's difficult to get a full account.
Speaker 4: Now that the sun is coming up and hopefully the
Speaker 4: winds die down, maybe we'll get better visuals of what's
Speaker 4: going on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm assuming a lot of those people have absolutely
Speaker 1: no idea as to whether their homes have survived.
Speaker 2: Or not, and I we are getting at Yeah, I mean, I.
Speaker 1: Will be scrambling, and I'm assuming people are asking everybody
Speaker 1: and anybody is there any reporting of neighborhoods that have
Speaker 1: gone down? How people are dealing with it?
Speaker 2: And I know it's kind of rough throwing a microphone
Speaker 2: in front of someone's.
Speaker 1: Face, Hey, how you feeling your family just died? You know,
Speaker 1: I know how stupid that is. But talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about what the conversation is if you've heard it,
Speaker 1: and what the concerns are.
Speaker 4: Right, people have been a little hesitant to talk formally
Speaker 4: to me, but they are talking to me in background basically,
Speaker 4: and then I can relay their stories a little bit.
Speaker 4: So Hopefully I'll find some people who can. You know,
Speaker 4: it is difficult to go up to them, especially with
Speaker 4: it still going on and they don't know exactly what's happening.
Speaker 4: And you know, I did just see a family walk
Speaker 4: past here with two young kids, and it look like
Speaker 4: one of the kids was holding one of those pet boxes,
Speaker 4: you know, with a pet inside. So I mean, everybody
Speaker 4: was completely disrupted. So you have that going on, with
Speaker 4: the looming uncertainty of what's happening in your neighborhood. But
Speaker 4: one of the gentlemen that I spoke to, says another
Speaker 4: guy he knows has not been able to get in
Speaker 4: touch with his elderly parents. The land lines are down,
Speaker 4: they don't have a mobile phone, and it doesn't think
Speaker 4: that they were able to get out. So it's difficult.
Speaker 4: You know, when we think of all the technology that
Speaker 4: we have, if it becomes unavailable and you can't get somewhere,
Speaker 4: then you're left with that worry. So a lot of
Speaker 4: questions here in Westwood for these folks at the evacuation
Speaker 4: center as they wait for word, and we've got all
Speaker 4: of the up to the minute information either coming from
Speaker 4: officials or even following the fire on social media, but
Speaker 4: you don't know until you know for sure. And that's
Speaker 4: what I think everybody just wants to know. Here is
Speaker 4: what's happening on their block, all right.
Speaker 1: In terms of setting the the center up, do they
Speaker 1: have are they bringing kitchens, food, food trucks? Are they
Speaker 1: looking at staying there for a number of days or
Speaker 1: does it feel very temporary that they're up and out
Speaker 1: of there next day or two.
Speaker 4: I mean, this is a rec center, so it's a
Speaker 4: solid structure, and they just bring in the cots. They
Speaker 4: bring in some seating, and they do bring in some
Speaker 4: food for people to get when they need it. I
Speaker 4: did notice a sign that says, please don't bring donations here,
Speaker 4: so take your donations. If people are soliciting that, make
Speaker 4: sure you're finding reputable donation sites to drop off. It's
Speaker 4: not the evacuation centers that want any of that. So
Speaker 4: they are bringing in what they need and not anything
Speaker 4: beyond that. But I can tell you the cots are
Speaker 4: being used. I'm seeing a lot of people, you know,
Speaker 4: munching and standing around, having some coffee and just waiting
Speaker 4: for word for what might be next. I'll also note
Speaker 4: that you know this is not an area that's been
Speaker 4: hit by the fire, but it was certainly hit by
Speaker 4: the winds. And I've been here since early this morning,
Speaker 4: and crews from the Parks and Recreation Department were already
Speaker 4: on site picking up massive branches and pieces of trees
Speaker 4: that had blown over. It was kind of a mess here.
Speaker 4: And you know, beyond the fire damage, those winds have
Speaker 4: I have definitely hurt some other things.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you this.
Speaker 4: I mean, I know we've got multiple fires burning, but
Speaker 4: when I left downtown LA this morning, it felt.
Speaker 2: As though the fire were there.
Speaker 4: You could smell it so thickly, and the cars and
Speaker 4: my parking lot were covered in dirt and slot and
Speaker 4: all that. It looked like in a dark covering on
Speaker 4: the wind shield. This is burning in very specific places, obviously,
Speaker 4: but it seems like all of us in the area
Speaker 4: are literally physically feeling it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And at the same time, why don't you ask Amy
Speaker 1: how comfortable she is sitting in her news booth and
Speaker 1: just listening to you.
Speaker 2: I could have had one more day in there with you, Bill,
Speaker 2: you could have That's right.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately she's feeling a little bit better. Hey, is the
Speaker 1: Red Cross involved at all? Michael, resist this.
Speaker 4: Is a city fire is here with this wind, but
Speaker 4: the Red Cross is typically involved in a lot of
Speaker 4: these as well, So whether this is something that will
Speaker 4: be handed over to another agency at some point, I'm
Speaker 4: not exactly sure. That the public information officer from the
Speaker 4: fire department had arrived about the same time I did
Speaker 4: and was looking to gather some of the information that
Speaker 4: I'm hoping to relay to you at some point, like
Speaker 4: how many people there are, what the operations look.
Speaker 2: Like right now.
Speaker 4: You've got a lot of people hanging out in their
Speaker 4: cars too, so they're here at the evacuation center, maybe
Speaker 4: if they need access to a bathroom or if they
Speaker 4: want to spread out and lie down on one of
Speaker 4: those CODs, but a lot of people are here in
Speaker 4: this parking lot hanging out, and it is just it's windy,
Speaker 4: the wind is cold, and the sky, like I said,
Speaker 4: is just it's so ominous, and you have such contrasts
Speaker 4: with the sun glowing in one side, the blue skies
Speaker 4: on the other side, and then just in the middle
Speaker 4: here it's just dark.
Speaker 2: What an aberrational time, Michael.
Speaker 1: I know you're going to be reporting most of the day,
Speaker 1: so we'll probably talk again, and if not this segment
Speaker 1: or the next two, certainly on Gary and Shannon, Michael,
Speaker 1: take care of yourself?
Speaker 3: Thanks Bill.
Speaker 1: All right, as Michael Leavesy talked about how the pallor
Speaker 1: of the smoke, just watching a report on k t
Speaker 1: LA and one of the reporters and they're they're wearing.
Speaker 2: Ski goggles and face masks.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: The the mask was this dark, dingy gray.
Speaker 2: His hands you could see we're dirty.
Speaker 1: And the mic flag, you know where it says like
Speaker 1: our KFI mic flag at the end of a microphone
Speaker 1: that was starting to get gray and spotty just from
Speaker 1: the ash.
Speaker 2: It's insane. And who's up next?
Speaker 1: I know we're changing and we're bringing in, you know,
Speaker 1: various people.
Speaker 2: This is quote fluid this morning. Who's up next?
Speaker 5: Cool thing is Bill Ann has really busted her hump
Speaker 5: to make sure you have a list in front of you,
Speaker 5: and well I have to your dear friend is going
Speaker 5: to be joining us.
Speaker 2: Oh, Chuck Lovers is coming. Oh okay, yeah, oh you
Speaker 2: know did I print that? Oh yeah, that's on the printer.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 5: I thought maybe you might talk to Gary Hoffin briefly
Speaker 5: about you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, we can do that. Yeah, we can do that. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 2: we got a lot fair enough. Thank you for con no,
Speaker 2: thank you for straightening that out. Hey, this is why
Speaker 2: I get paid the big bucks for doing this.
Speaker 1: You know, Oh, Gary and Shannon, you know follow this show.
Speaker 2: Gary.
Speaker 1: I was listening to Gary this morning because people have
Speaker 1: been up there or we've been here all night. I
Speaker 1: was listening to Gary talk about driving in this morning
Speaker 1: and what he saw, and just as a precursor, Gary
Speaker 1: lives if I'm not if I'm right up in the
Speaker 1: Santa Clarita Valley which is north well north of Burbank,
Speaker 1: And so Gary, if you could repeat, because I think
Speaker 1: it's worth repeating what you saw this morning and how
Speaker 1: you came in.
Speaker 6: So I got the alert actually that I was in
Speaker 6: an evacuation zone, which I wasn't, And I got three
Speaker 6: of them to say that I was in an evacuation
Speaker 6: zone and I wasn't in any of those three.
Speaker 2: But it did get me awake.
Speaker 6: So I got things ready because the the fire in Silmar,
Speaker 6: the Hearst fire, is the closest one to us, and
Speaker 6: there are some evacuation zones near us. So what I
Speaker 6: did was I got up, got the basic you know,
Speaker 6: the basics ready if we ever had to.
Speaker 5: Get out of there.
Speaker 6: And then I kissed my wife on the forehead and
Speaker 6: left and said you're good and driving in coming down
Speaker 6: the New Hall Pass, I mean basically I got out
Speaker 6: of the door of my house and I could see
Speaker 6: the fire in Silmar cresting the top of that ridge.
Speaker 6: And then as I come down the New Hall Pass,
Speaker 6: you can see the glow on the opposite side of
Speaker 6: the hill. And as you've come farther down the freeway,
Speaker 6: it just the orange flames, active flames just explode to
Speaker 6: the left of you.
Speaker 5: They're just all over the side of that hill.
Speaker 2: And you drive through Silmar to get to Bourbank.
Speaker 6: Yes, right down I five there was another fire actually
Speaker 6: right close to where the five and the one seventy
Speaker 6: split on the northbound side. As I was driving down,
Speaker 6: it was a little vegetation. They put it out, no problem,
Speaker 6: but the road five northbound had been closed first when
Speaker 6: I drove by it it was actually closed down. That
Speaker 6: would I mean, that was hours ago by this time,
Speaker 6: but it still was just indicative of the kind of problems.
Speaker 6: And then as I got farther down sort of North
Speaker 6: Hollywood area, I could see the fire, the eating fire
Speaker 6: over an Altadena, which was crazy because I did not
Speaker 6: expect to see that. I did not expect it to
Speaker 6: be visible from this side from the San Fernando Valley,
Speaker 6: and it was clearly visible. And then this morning, I mean,
Speaker 6: I know that Neil set you a picture of what
Speaker 6: we can see out of sort of the south facing
Speaker 6: windows that face over the one thirty four freeway here
Speaker 6: in Burbank and the just incredible black cloud of smoke
Speaker 6: that's been kicked up by that eating fire.
Speaker 1: All right, Gary, thank you as always, And of course
Speaker 1: Gary start, Gary and Shannon start at nine o'clock and
Speaker 1: they're going to be covering of all aspects of the fire.
Speaker 1: So you got a little ways until Gary shows up. Now,
Speaker 1: Chuck Lovers is with a Chuck, let me do this.
Speaker 1: I am going to take an early break come back
Speaker 1: so we have a full segment that I can talk
Speaker 1: to you about. Chuck having been with La County Fire
Speaker 1: for thirty some odd years. Also, there are some headlines
Speaker 1: going on that we have ignored.
Speaker 2: There are other things going on in the world.
Speaker 1: Probably the lead story the girl Scouts have dropped two
Speaker 1: of their cookies.
Speaker 2: I don't know if you knew that, but that's big,
Speaker 2: big news, and Neil is scrambling to find out exactly
Speaker 2: which two.
Speaker 1: Chuck Lovers is a friend of mine and was with
Speaker 1: La County Fire and had been for over thirty years.
Speaker 1: And Chuck and I have spent hours talking about firefighting
Speaker 1: and his experience. And as this fire broke out and
Speaker 1: I saw La County firefighters there at the forefront, Chuck,
Speaker 1: just my visualization is of you standing there with your
Speaker 1: crew fighting the fire. I also visualize you standing in
Speaker 1: the shower naked, but that's for another show at another time.
Speaker 2: So Chuck, as your look at.
Speaker 1: This, the first question I thought was, you know, what
Speaker 1: do you do other than get the hell out of
Speaker 1: the way when something like this happens.
Speaker 3: Well, yes, of course you have to protect yourself, but
Speaker 3: it's very disheartening when the fires are that big. You know,
Speaker 3: we do you work, and you never seem to gain anything.
Speaker 3: So that's that's probably the hardest part, trying to get
Speaker 3: a foothold somewhere and make a difference.
Speaker 1: When there is a fire like this where you have
Speaker 1: the gusts of wind blowing in one direction and then
Speaker 1: three minutes later switching and going the other direction. Do
Speaker 1: you ever stage firefighters at various points just in case
Speaker 1: the fire goes that way because it has or do
Speaker 1: you just go for the fire itself, the one the
Speaker 1: house that's ignited, and then you try to go to
Speaker 1: the other one and you're bouncing back and forth.
Speaker 2: What goes through the planning and the thinking.
Speaker 3: Okay, well you plan for wind reversals because that's what
Speaker 3: gets you, that's what hurts people. So you're always you're
Speaker 3: always looking behind you, always always watching the smoke, because
Speaker 3: of the smoke gives you a tell tale that something is changing.
Speaker 3: But you do the best you can. And when a
Speaker 3: house is beyond what you can do, you have to
Speaker 3: kind of the house that isn't burning it, You got
Speaker 3: to protect that one. Does that make sense? Yeah?
Speaker 2: It does. So you can't do anything more.
Speaker 1: And the house is basically gone, even though maybe it's
Speaker 1: only ten or twenty percent engulfed, and you know that
Speaker 1: it's gone, you write it off.
Speaker 3: Is that right correct? And we have to try to
Speaker 3: protect the exposures, to try to contain the fire as
Speaker 3: much as as you can, try to stop its growth.
Speaker 1: Who makes that decision saying Okay, you're off of this house.
Speaker 2: You go to the next one.
Speaker 3: Pretty much everybody does that. You know, when you're on
Speaker 3: a house and just you and your unit, you do
Speaker 3: the best you can and if that one is lost
Speaker 3: and you protect you know, you're protecting the exposures to
Speaker 3: start with, along with fighting the fire. But at some
Speaker 3: point you have to concentrate just on the exposures because
Speaker 3: you can't, you know, the fire has grown too big
Speaker 3: for your unit.
Speaker 1: But when you when the wind is blowing so hard
Speaker 1: as it has been, and of course that gives a
Speaker 1: lot of fuel to the fire. I mean, obviously it
Speaker 1: needs a lot of oxygen and wind gives lots to it,
Speaker 1: and aircraft can't get up the air assets.
Speaker 2: How big a deficit is that?
Speaker 1: I mean how much do you rely on those airplanes
Speaker 1: and helicopters a great deal?
Speaker 3: And over the years, the aircraft, the technology has increased.
Speaker 3: They can fly in the higher winds than when I
Speaker 3: first started, so they they're a big asset. They can
Speaker 3: they can drop a lot of water in an area
Speaker 3: and calm it down, so you can actually go in
Speaker 3: as a hand unit and do something.
Speaker 1: So do I know that the aircraft actually reports on
Speaker 1: what's going on on the ground, things that you can't
Speaker 1: see direction of a fire things a couple of miles
Speaker 1: away that's moving in your direction. Do the aircraft report
Speaker 1: directly to you the battalion chief who gets that information?
Speaker 3: Okay, well, directly talk with the helicopter pilots when they're
Speaker 3: working with you. But normally Helco controls the environment up there.
Speaker 3: It's a helicopter with a battalion cheap or somebody, and
Speaker 3: he's directing the traffic and telling the helicopters where they're
Speaker 3: best needed. And they keep this. They separate the airspace
Speaker 3: between the helicopters and the and the fixed airway. You know,
Speaker 3: they have different patterns that they have to fly, and
Speaker 3: so they keep them set as much as they can
Speaker 3: for safety reasons.
Speaker 2: All right, do they I missed that part about who
Speaker 2: they talk to.
Speaker 1: If you're on the line, you're you have a fire
Speaker 1: truck and you're a unit that's there.
Speaker 2: Do the aircraft talk directly to you on the fire line?
Speaker 3: If I'm working directly with a helicopter, yes, But normally,
Speaker 3: if if the helicopter is just flying up there, they're
Speaker 3: they're controlled by Helco. It's an air traffic controller for
Speaker 3: the helicopters and he's up in the air with them,
Speaker 3: so again and then he's and he's keeping them separate
Speaker 3: from the fixed air wings because there's another air traffic
Speaker 3: control for the fixed air.
Speaker 1: And how many are typically and I know you can't
Speaker 1: say specifically, but on a fire of this magnitude, if
Speaker 1: the aircraft could go up, which I'm assuming they're going
Speaker 1: to this morning, what are you looking at?
Speaker 2: Numbers and kinds of aircraft.
Speaker 3: I have no idea what the numbers are, but you know,
Speaker 3: I understand that the Super Scoopers which we contract with,
Speaker 3: they were up yesterday and hopefully they'll be up today
Speaker 3: because their turnaround time is very quick.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: I did see some some fixed wing with foz check
Speaker 3: on the TV last night. Uh, and they'll come out
Speaker 3: of like fox Field, which you know it's a ways
Speaker 3: a way. But the helicopters I have, I really don't
Speaker 3: know how many helicopters we have now, but we've transitioned
Speaker 3: to more Blackhawks, or we call them firehawks. They're very
Speaker 3: big and very stable in the winds.
Speaker 1: Right, So, Chuck, I just saw one last one and
Speaker 1: this is just between us chickens. When I ask you
Speaker 1: how many up there, you cannot answer. I don't know.
Speaker 1: You have to make something up because you sound you
Speaker 1: have to sound like you know what you're talking about.
Speaker 3: Okay, I did it. Uh, But you know we have
Speaker 3: we have La City and we have U and Ventura
Speaker 3: has helicopters. Uh and Orange County has now contracts for helicopters.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of helicopters that have wasn't it
Speaker 3: didn't go angering?
Speaker 2: And who is it?
Speaker 1: Someone has to be the lead agency that actually moves
Speaker 1: everybody around.
Speaker 3: Who is that actually? The state? Oh? Yes, okay, they
Speaker 3: controlled how equipment is ALLOCID when it comes from outside
Speaker 3: of an area.
Speaker 2: Okay, that helps a lot. Chuck, thanks always, great stuff
Speaker 2: on this. Thanks for taking the time.
Speaker 3: Okay, Bill, and take care of yourself you too.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Here we are in southern California.
Speaker 1: Chuck knows more about this stuff than anybody you will
Speaker 1: ever hear. Thirty years he was doing this and ran
Speaker 1: cruise and you just you could spend hours with Chuck
Speaker 1: just talking about all of this. There's a world to
Speaker 1: firefighting and the technology as he describes what's happened through
Speaker 1: the years. All Right, this is KFI a M six
Speaker 1: forty more stimulating talk radio.
Speaker 2: You've been listening to The Bill Handle Show.
Speaker 1: Catch My Show Monday through Friday six am to nine am,
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