Friends, there's a major brush fire burning north of US HWY 287 at present, about 10 miles west of Wichita Falls. The nearest fire boundary is less than a mile from our home. The nearest highway onramp (westbound) has been closed, and evacuation orders have been issued for people just one north-south farm road to the east of us. A number of Forest Service aircraft have been tackling the fire, including at least one C-130 water bomber. It's not helping that winds are gusting in the 50- to 70-mph range as I write these words (and the surface winds have just shifted in our direction). There's a lot of smoke in the air.
Please say a prayer for the safety of the fire crews working the blaze, and for everyone threatened by it. We hope they'll be able to keep things under control, but it's very difficult in winds like this. We might have an "interesting" night, in the sense of the ancient Chinese curse.
Peter
15 comments:
Wichita Falls, I was there for 5 months in 1984 going to the USAF Teletype Maintenance school. It was snowing the day I arrived and 80 degrees the next day. After I graduated I went back to Lackland for Crypto Maintenance as the carrier fields had been merged. I sent almost a year in training before I got my first asignment.
Best wishes, but start loading the car with what you treasure.
When they issue evacuation orders it's time to drive away, not play catch-up.
Prayers up.
Load the car, sleep fully dressed, have Ashbutt in a carrier for the night
Completely Agree w/Aesop... wind changes direction, and yer hosed. Better to be ready to bail than be BBQ (ask the Hawaiians who said "Nah, It'll be fine" in that shytte show....)
BCE nailed it. If you have to leave, it needs to be right now. Get in the vehicle and go.
I've seen a lot of range fires around Amarillo over the years and fought a few of them when I was a teenager. The wind can shift very suddenly and the wind speed can also abruptly change. The fires can move really fast. I watched cattle being driven through a barbed wire fence into a plowed field because there wasn't time to cut the fence. He who hesitates is lost.
Don't wait to evacuate. Fire in winds like that can travel a mile in almost no time.
Get ready to go NOW...and then leave. It's a lot easier to come back later than to
try and dodge a wall of fire. I have a friend who lost his home in the Camp Fire 5 years ago.
He and his wife had virtually NO notice and got out with nothing but their cat. They are lucky to be alive.
As of 4AM on Sunday morning, the fire nearest us appears to be almost 100% contained, and the strong wind that was complicating matters has died down. The smoke has largely dissipated.
However, it looks increasingly as if we have a firebug problem. There were three outbreaks of fire near us within an hour or two of each other, and another fire near the town of Holliday, not far away, was brought under control, then flared up unexpectedly a few hours later. We've been under Red Flag warning conditions for several days (the extreme heat of summer drying out everything and making our brush and mesquite thickets into so much tinder), and a couple of our local law enforcement agencies regard this rapid-fire (you should pardon the expression) outbreak of blazes in the same general area as "suspicious". There are a lot of angry Texans looking for clues right now. One hopes, for the sake of any guilty parties, that they restrain their feelings when it comes to making arrests (if any).
So far, so good. Thanks for the good wishes and prayers.
Peter, Aesop and others gave you excellent advice.
Happy thus far you didn't have to flee.
Your concern for the ecoterrorists doing the fire is gravely misplaced.
What did you do in Africa with terrs?
Fire evacuation is my greatest fear as routes can disappear in flames or worse eco terrorist armed blockades.
Losing my preps is a real concern thus I have mutual assistance with a few families where we cache supplies there and they here.
Burnouts is on the Marxist battle book. A failing empire shrinking into Green Zones will do it to deny non loyal folks supplies and shelter.
Peter, your good about knowing about fleeing blue hives, BUT the automobile make it easy to spread their evil across our red zones. We are in a culture war you know.
My wife and I live in Roger Mills County, Oklahoma, to your northwest. We've seen strings of fires appear in the area on the worst possible days during periods of drought since 2004. Pretty obvious when they start up at just the driving time from one to the next. Some in the past have been the work of local nutjobs, and the odd volunteer fireman addicted to the excitement. But in recent years these seem to be the work of animal rights activists opposed to cattle ranching, and Greens promoting the "climate emergency". What better way to show your love for nature than burning it up, right?
prayers added
good luck
Consider implementing a "defensible space" around your property. Your local fire service or the state forestry office can give you lots of help and guidance in making sure that nothing flammable is next to your structures.
I worked in the wild land fire service for a time and saw too many houses lost because the owner was too lazy/dumb to prepare for that day fire comes to visit.
Regimes seldom bother the hinterland initially. More payoff by disrupting urban areas. Greater pop. density and impact.
(See Soros DAs & latest 50+ "assault team" looting upscale shop in SoCal).
Peter,
is it feasible to bury one or more large plastic water tanks in your back yard? I'm thinking that a small generator and/or a battery pack to power a water pump could be used to move water to the roofs of your house and shed to wet them down in a fire situation. This would also give you a water supply for SHTF times. It might be easier and/or cheaper to bury several smaller tanks than one big tank.
A sister had a tank positioned at the crest of a hill on her property to supply water under pressure to use in and around the house. Water actually came from a river on the property, but the tank was intended to generate water pressure when the grid was down, which was fairly often. They would pump the tank full when the power was available. They generally used bottled water for consumption, but could boil the river water if needed. It was collected from a buried sandpoint we positioned in the riverbed. I think they had a 1500 gal tank.
I suppose you could also mount a handpump to a tank, but I would not want that to be visible to the public. I would also be leery of letting anyone local know you have done this, to avoid demands from others in troubled times. Wouldn't be surprised to find regulations that limit or block this being done. Water rights can be weird is lots of places.
Fires and Tornados, living out in the boonies where we do, take your pick as to which can be worse...it’s the one that gets you. In 2011 fires were blazing in West Texas pushed by 100 degree heat and 50 - 60 mph winds, my wife and I had 2 water hoses going on the house because fire was within 200 yards, it was impossible because of the heat and wind, when we got one end of the house wetted down the other end was already dry, it was like being inside a giant convection oven...we packed 2 pickups full of keepsakes and valuables and parked them in the middle of our wheat field in case the house burned down...thank the Lord we were spared......
Fast forward 12 years.... June 21, 2023....a rain wrapped monster tornado descended on our little community with very little warning....our house, shop, outbuildings, corrals, barn, fences....all gone in less time than it took me to post this....and many of my neighbors suffered the same losses....heartbreaking... but we are resilient Texans and we will rebuild. Thank the Lord all of my family survived. That is all that matters, we all survived....when I get to pondering the enormity of our loss and the task of rebuilding 30 years of work and sweat and love and cherished memories....well, I just have to reflect on all those good times and give thanks because we can grieve the loss of lumber and tin, and pipe, and vehicles, and other worldly goods, but we are not mourning the loss of loved ones....thanks be to our Lord and Savior!! And we are not alone in suffering enourmous loss...so we keep it all in perspective.....
Y’all stay safe and we’re praying for your safety....
Jim
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