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Four Seasons Beaumont Breeze, Dec. 2017

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8 FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | DECEMBER 2017 Dave Sapsis, Research Program Specialist with the state's Fire and Resource Assessment Program, recently provided an assessment on the rapid spread of the wildfires in Sonoma "was not a giant front of flames sweeping out of the nearby hills and fields. Most likely, the fire was touched off by embers blown from a distance. Firebrands capable of igniting a house can travel more than a mile. When you've got firebrands going into every crook and cranny, they're going to find somewhere to start. Fire experts surmise that most of the damage was caused by fire spreading from house to house, leaving some parkway trees and things like trash cans oddly unscathed." "Those houses are like highly concentrated energy packages just waiting to ignite," said Donald Falk, a wildland fire researcher in the University of Arizona School of Natural Resources and the Environment. "In that wind-driven situation, I think the predictions of what's fire-safe and what's not kind of go out the window." Similar urban conflagrations have been seen before. In 1982, an exposed electrical wire touched off a fire that was driven by Santa Ana winds through a four-block area of Anaheim, destroying 40 apartment buildings. "We are seeing it happen more often," Moritz, the UC researcher, said. ~ Len Tavernetti Urban Wildfires

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