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Napa & Sonoma CA Wildfires

Uncle-A

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One of my friends that is really into wine made a statement the other day that "it seems suspicious that 8-9 fires started in wine country all at once". Has anyone heard others say something is suspicious?
 

luliski

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One of my friends that is really into wine made a statement the other day that "it seems suspicious that 8-9 fires started in wine country all at once". Has anyone heard others say something is suspicious?
It is fire season. It was extremely windy, even for the area where the fires got going. I read yesterday that a PGE (Pacific GAs and Electric) employee thought that toppled power lines and blown transformers started the fires (I don't think this was an official PGE statement), but it could have been a spark from anything, with the conditions that existed.
 

skibob

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What's weird is the houses on fire but the trees around them are not. Is that common? Do the trees burn later?
Yes. The spread through wildland by going to the ground and burning dry brush, leaving the trees to burn slowly. They go through residential areas by burning from house to house, which are a lot drier than trees.

ironically, even trees that lose all of their foliage, a huge percentage will survive and resprout next spring (or now in the casae of evergreens).
 

skibob

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One of my friends that is really into wine made a statement the other day that "it seems suspicious that 8-9 fires started in wine country all at once". Has anyone heard others say something is suspicious?
It may only be one or two fires. Atlas started first. Then the winds sunday evening were nearly hurricane level on the mountain tops. Its almost certain, for example, that the Nunns fire was spawned from Tubbs. Pocket fire also seems almost certain to have been spawned by sparks from Tubbs. Firefighters have put out many--hudreds? of little ember spawned fires before they became worthy of naming.

@luliski statement about PG&E likely accounts for some of it too.
 

luliski

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I've been working (12 hour shifts) the past two days, so not up to date on containment. One of my co-workers had to evacuate her house in Green Valley area of Fairfield. Another co-worker, who also works at a hospital in Fairfield, said that many of the nurses at that hospital lived in Sonoma and Napa counties, and were still working despite being evacuated because they didn't know what else to do. My SO said Russian River Brewing in Santa Rosa opened on Wednesday with all-day happy hour. The regulars there (he is one of them) were sharing stories similar to @skibob 's of fleeing in the night.
 

Tony

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If anyone wants to donate using their cell phone and PayPal or Credit Card, Bay Area radio stations KNBR, KFOG, KSAN, KGO and KSFO have a way to do it that they say will give 100% of donations to Fire victims. Text KGO810 or KNBR680 to 779-48 and they will respond with a bit.ly link that will take you to donation page.

If you do it today, Chilton Auto Body will match the first $25K in donations (up from $10K announced - and reached - earlier today).
 

John Webb

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BTW, you may have heard that Chateau St Jean was destroyed. That does appear to be true. However, CSJ hasn't actually been made there in years. Treasury WIne Estates (parent company, 3 or 4 largest wine co in world) moved production to their big Napa facility long ago and mothballed the winery.

Sorry to hear Chateau St Jean was mothballed with production moved into Napa. Big surprise as It was a fav.

I suspect Gallo has bought many wineries all over CA.
 

John Webb

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One of my friends that is really into wine made a statement the other day that "it seems suspicious that 8-9 fires started in wine country all at once". Has anyone heard others say something is suspicious?
Not that suspicious as we had a sudden burst of very high and very erratic winds in a 2 hour period the night of Oct 9.

All the fires (exc Canyon 2) flared north of I-80 from Santa Rosa to the foothills where I live. We went to a Calfire meeting last night where they said the 2 fires
near us are stable and just about out. They have cancelled evacuations in Nevada Co. Sadly 25 or 30 homes burned down. Nothing like continuing firestorms
in Santa Rosa, Sonoma & Napa.
 

skibob

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Sorry to hear Chateau St Jean was mothballed with production moved into Napa. Big surprise as It was a fav.

I suspect Gallo has bought many wineries all over CA.
Yep. J Winery, formerly one of my favorites being about the most recent. Edna Valley Vyd purchased a few years ago also wiped out one of my favorite "cheap chardonnay that doesn't suck" options.
 

skibob

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We went back to the house today for the first time. Installed a new air filter and improvised filters (Furnace air filters taped over a fan). Helped clean up the air but the carpet and upholstery still reeks. The good news is, other than police blocking off several streets to our north, you can't really see the devastation from the route to our house. We were really concerned about what the kids would see when we return.

We are also lucky to have purchased a new Chevy Volt last week to replace an old subaru as our third car. But stil have the Subaru. And an extra car (the volt) AND a car our company was trying to sell. So, all of those on loan to friends who lost a vehicle and are still getting insurance sorted out.

A friend who is an agent for a large, well known insurer told me on Wed morning they already had 1400 home claims and 800 auto in Napa and Sonoma counties.
 

luliski

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A friend who is a contractor in Sebastopol and Santa Rosa already knows of 6 houses that he custom built that burned down. I wonder if his business is going to be very busy again. Last ski season he barely skied because he had so much business; and he has to take the work when he has it. At swim practice a couple of my teammates have parents or in-laws who lost homes. In both cases the people are old enough that they don't want to rebuild. I'm just now reading the news about the missing and fatalities. Really sad...
 

skibob

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A friend who is a contractor in Sebastopol and Santa Rosa already knows of 6 houses that he custom built that burned down. I wonder if his business is going to be very busy again. Last ski season he barely skied because he had so much business; and he has to take the work when he has it. At swim practice a couple of my teammates have parents or in-laws who lost homes. In both cases the people are old enough that they don't want to rebuild. I'm just now reading the news about the missing and fatalities. Really sad...
I think every builder willing to get to Santa Rosa to work is going to be very busy again. May interfere with our plans to build on Donner Lake next summer, TBH.

As for the fatalities, its so sad, but not surprising. I've just never known anything to move like this.

When it sank in it scared the s**t out of me. When our neighbor woke us up at 1:40 (actually one at the door and one on the phone simultaneously) the fire had already passed us by. We went out on the porch and looked to the NW and felt the fire was far away ( was only about 2/3 mile in actuality), but that we'd better evacuate to be safe. What we didn't realize is that it had ALREADY burned through a 1/4 to a 1/3 mile north of us and passed us by. I'm just not shocked that some got caught by it. I'll be shocked, I am sorry to say, if they are done identifying the deceased. There but for the grace of the wind gods . . .
 

luliski

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I think every builder willing to get to Santa Rosa to work is going to be very busy again. May interfere with our plans to build on Donner Lake next summer, TBH.

As for the fatalities, its so sad, but not surprising. I've just never known anything to move like this.

When it sank in it scared the s**t out of me. When our neighbor woke us up at 1:40 (actually one at the door and one on the phone simultaneously) the fire had already passed us by. We went out on the porch and looked to the NW and felt the fire was far away ( was only about 2/3 mile in actuality), but that we'd better evacuate to be safe. What we didn't realize is that it had ALREADY burned through a 1/4 to a 1/3 mile north of us and passed us by. I'm just not shocked that some got caught by it. I'll be shocked, I am sorry to say, if they are done identifying the deceased. There but for the grace of the wind gods . . .
You're lucky to have good neighbors...
 

Philpug

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Good grief Charlie Brown. It's reported Charles Schultz's (rip) home in Santa Rosa burned. His wife
was living there.
I saw that too. I cannot imagine the priceless memorabilia that was there. I do understand most everything was at the museum but what what there had to be incredibly personal and unique.
 

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