Cedars, September 2018

September 2018 6 OFF CAMPUS by Breanna Beers I t’s been said that California’s four sea- sons are riot, earthquake, flood and fire. As cynical as this may be, the last of these has been raising international con- cern for the past few months. For the past several years, California has been plagued by drought, which com- bines with the region’s intense heat and coastal winds to produce an ideal climate for the start and spread of wildfires. Ac- cording to the California state website, as of Aug. 26, there have been 4,434 fires record- ed and almost 900,000 acres consumed this year. Although the total number of fires is comparable to the same interval last year, the number of acres consumed has nearly quadrupled. Cassidy Wilkinson, a sophomore nurs- ing student from Los Angeles, was evacuat- ed from her home in early May because of an approaching wildfire. “Where my house is, it backs up right on a mountain, and California’s great for be- ing dry and hot,” Wilkinson said. “So a lot of car fires will start right there, and the cars will overheat and they’ll pull over and then set the hill on fire.” To a certain extent, biology professor Dr. Mark Gathany said, wildfires are a nat- ural and essential part of the California eco- system. “Those systems require fire to be main- tained,” Gathany said, “because if we don’t burn them, fuel just keeps building until the lightning strikes and then you have a huge fire.” However, the situation in California this year goes beyond the expectations for the typical summer fire season. Tens of thousands of firefighters have been working on the blazes, with long days and little relief, aided by additional manpower from across the United States and several countries. Despite the intense pressure, Wilkinson said, these men and women are incredibly effective, prioritizing human life and safety above all else. “They’re always really quick,” Wilkin- son said. “They’re super good at alerting ev- erybody when to get out. It’s not often that someone is stuck in their home because they didn’t hear about a fire. ... They’re really selfless and willing to put their lives on the line for people and to protect their homes. That’s their number-one goal.” Wilkinson said evacuations because of fires happen “a few times every fewmonths,” usually forecast by the helicopters rising above the smoke on the horizon. But while Wilkinson has grown used to the occasional dangers of the southern California climate, she puts the wildfires happening further up- state in a separate category altogether. “The fires are pretty common, so it doesn’t really affect me anymore because I’ve lived there my whole life,” Wilkinson said. “But the fires that are happening in northern California, like in Redding, those are way more intense. Obviously, homes have burned down and people have died, so that’s something that’s been on our mind a lot since we love our state and it’s hard to see so many people losing their lives.” In Northern California, the Carr fire alone has raged across 230,000 acres, de- stroyed or damaged nearly 2,000 build- ings and killed six people, including three firefighters. Now 96 percent contained, the Carr fire is the sixth most destructive blaze in state history. According to Gathany, the ecology of the northern and southern regions of the state explains the varied frequency and in- tensity of the fires. While Southern Califor- nia typically has a greater frequency of fires, the north is currently experiencing more in- tense, raging blazes, despite the area’s usual relative stability. “All of the different grasslands, shrub- lands, forests of all kinds are very differ- ent systems,” Gathany said. “We talk often about fire return intervals. ... In the more southwest U.S. our returns are typically two to 10 years in one location. So you would expect to see more [fires], because they’re growing more grasses and shrubs there. As you go up further north — so, as you get into Yosemite, which has a big fire active right now — those places would be expected to be burning [at a return interval of] multiple decades to centuries, just because of the na- ture of the system: the weather, the climate, the trees that are typical up in there, how long it takes them to accumulate that much Californian Combustion Why the West Coast has been blazing this year photo by Tasha Peterson “Area Closed for Fire Recovery” signs quarantine areas in Aliso Wood Canyon affected by a fire in June.