10:15pm—Here is a Google Earth Pro view of the Palisades fire crossing the wilderness north of Pacific Palisades and south of “Dry Mulholland”—the dirt road that serves as a firebreak along the ridge of the mountains south of the San Fernando Valley:
The large squares are MODIS satellite fire detections. The smaller ones are VIIRS. The fire is now farther north (toward the top) than you see here, and being fought by aircraft on the ridge:
I count ten aircraft including the Chninook whose flight path I’ve highlighted. Note three more on Encino Reservoir, scooping up water to drop on the fire, or on vegetation—in this case surrounding Mandeville Canyon, an enclave in the floor of the canyon south of San Vicente Mountain Park. By the way, these helicopters can carry and drop 3000 gallons (I think I just heard) and can refill in just 90 seconds.
Encino, north of the ridge, is being evacuated, wise precaution.
It’s important to note that winds are calm, allowing aircraft to do their work. This was not possible while Pacific Palisades and Altadena were largely destroyed by the Palisades and Eaton Fires. It was possible during the Sunset and Kenneth fires.
KABC/7 ha dramatic video, but also reports that the fire appears to be contained. One grab:
It’s important to note that dramatic pictures can, without meaning to, tell stories that aren’t quite true, or are less true than the picture suggests. For example, in my coverage of the Gap Fire near Santa Barbara in 2008, I used this picture of the Santa Barbara Mission.
When I shot that, I was by a rose garden about 800 feet east of the Mission, looking west past a fire 8 miles away, toward the setting Sun, 8 million miles away. Also, I underexposed the photo to make everything legible (and good photographically). I explained all that in text of my report. Still, many people looked at the picture and assumed that the Mission was on fire. Likewise, it’s easy to look at TV images of tiny helicopters floating in space above a flaming ridge and a wall of flames, as we see here as the index image used by KABC/7 for its video on the fires—
—and assume that this is a losing battle for the chopper people. It’s a great photograph, but the story it seems to tell is too simple, and too easily misleading.
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