More pictures of LZ fire

[Chip]

Here's some more pictures from today's fire. These are in the correct order. One minute were fine and things are looking up, all we need to do is mop up some hot spots and smolding areas and the next minute all hell breaks loose all over again. Gives you a good healthy respect for the men and women who do this for a profession.

Fire Engines in the LZ


During the small break several of us went around a surveyed the place


Looking west towards the newly started Porter Ranch fire, feeling a bit surrounded


Our north wind sock melted


Here's the area we were battling but lost quickly, these are woodchips burning. Joe and I had this area under control only about 10 minutes before it started gusting well over 35


Later after Joe and I lost the battle on the North side of the LZ the wind swept fire raced across the LZ. Here's the result.


The winds were switchy and sometimes moved over us causing a bit of concern


The REAL hero's move very quickly to stage anyplace where they think structures are in danger.

[JD]

Jeff,
Nice, but sad photos. I hope no homes were damaged in the area.
Good thing we didn't lose the as yet erected cell phone repeater or new shade structure. I hope you guys don't get sick from inhaling that stuff in the air.
Thanks for fightinng to save the club sock!
- Jonathan

[stebbins]

I want to publicly thank Joe, Chip and whoever else was there fighting the fire in the LZ. Wow.

Good work, guys! Hopefully, the worst is over for the LZ. But knowing how these things go, it could be a while.

Thank you very much for your super efforts.

[M@rkus]

Thanks for the update.
Very much appreciated.
M@rkus

[bricksfly]

Thanks for the picture updates, and the work from the folks that could make it to the LZ to help out.
I have a feeling our hours of work removing the brush and weeds recently took away quite a bit of fuel that would otherwise been an even bigger problem. Funny how these things work.

Sad to see the land burned, hope the loss to people and their homes is minimal.

[kyardley]

Thanks so much to all the SHGA Heroes who braved choking smoke and real bad stuff to safe our gliders.

Does Chip become "Woodchip" now?

Let's have a big party to celebrate.

Katherine

[Meg B]

Thanks for the fire fighting guys.

I see from the Kagel Kam the windsock still stands! "Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there, oh say...."

[Xander]

Thanks for the hard work and the updates.

I can't think of anything clever to write at this moment . . .

[Chip]

Our real true life LZ hero Joe Greblo worked tirelessly all day and night, I bet a shower felt good when he finally got a chance. Or is that Fire Marshall Bill?


I think it's BLOWING DOWN!


Fire Engines still trying to cool the wood chips 2:30 on Tuesday


Naked Trash


Our hero finally collapses


Got Bleach!!!!

Wonder who's batten charts those are.

[max]

Joe you definitely my hero and if you ever entered a political arena and run for the presidency I will vote for you. Thanks to everybody who helped out

[DrJeff]

Just adding my thanks to all the others for the amazing efforts of Joe and the pilots who helped him. You guys are amazing!

Dr. Jeff

[Steve90266]

Hey Joe-I'm going to write you into my ballot for President of the United States. I was going to write in Ron Paul, but that's another story.

Thanks to you and all the other pilots for taking care of all of our collective asses. Thanks to your hard work I still have a beautiful Falcon 3 sitting peacefully in the Windsports Garage. The dream lives!

Thanks again.

Steve Murillo

[Don]

Joe & et. al.

Thanks for the concern and hard work.

However, had my glider been destoyed it would have "forced" me to get that Litespeed S even sooner!

Again, thanks

[Glenn]

Amazing!!!! Thanks ALL!!!!!

[JD]

Thank you to Joe and Chip and everyone who helped protect and preserve the last vestige of hang gliding in Los Angeles County!

[dteal]

Joe - you are the man!!!!

I thought that the rest of you were joking about Joe running for office, but I guess I was wrong: http://www.tsgnet.com/pres.php?id=37074 ... ltl=Hsfcmp

You have my vote and support all the way!!!

DT

[greblo]

I've received a lot of phone calls and emails thanking me for "saving our l/z". Let me set the record straight! I, didn't save the l/z. The l/z was never in much danger because there isn't much to burn except an old gazebo (which many would like to see burn down), a couple old wood picnic tables (that are falling apart), 2 portable toilets (that we don't own), and our shade trees and oleanders. In fact, I never gave much thought to the l/z. My only concern EVER, was for the neighbors houses that are next to Dino's Triangle (200 ft. zone) and for that matter, my own house and customer gliders. So enough with the hero talk.

The real hero's are the people that did care about the l/z enough to come out in the middle of the night and pitch in because they thought it was in jeopardy, and those who offered, including Megan, Jose B and Cludy, Mike Knapp, Phil Bloom, Rob Burgiss, Julieanne Sikora, Eric Douglas, Richard Shaw, Jim Shaw, Fred Ballard, Jeff Chipman, Jim Thompson, Robert Bustamente, ex-pilot John Morris, Danny Black, Jim Shaw, Rick Holman, and those I'm sorry to have forgotten at the moment. If I missed your name, let us know.
We should all thank them;

Joe

[greblo]

I forgot to thank my wife Kris, Larry Chamblee, Kathryn Yardley, and Ken Andrews for dropping everything, manning the phones, and putting out the "call to arms" when I began to get overwhelmed by the wood chip fire.

It's good to know people that you can rely on.

Finally, I'm organizing a work party for Saturday morning at 10 am for the l/z and
maybe for launch if they let us up there.
Please see the Kagel Kam page for details.

[dhmartens]

Somehow the grass looks greener now. Maybe we can cover the wood chips with soil, extend the sprinklers and grow grass there. Ive seen a number of broken down tubes over 4 years on that padded bank and no noticeable injury. It would be a shame to see it all rocky. Again thanks to Joe, Chip and Robert for their tactical assistance on the ground and to the dozen or so pilot militia that showed up as a reserve force. Luckily you weren't needed but the media was forecasting "hurricane force winds" and "65 mph winds" and I could only imagine the firestorm that would bring to Sylmar. I stood ready to come out with hose and dust masks but a firestorm was no place for my car with a flammable rag top. I'll be out to help on Saturday.

Doug
I think the windsock is still standing because firefighters have a priority to keep mountain tops from burning because they launch burning embers for miles downwind. The were water dropping on a remote mountain top out near Simi for just that reason.

[Chip]

The following pictures are from JoseB.

You can see the progression of the fire from a great vantage point. The first few pictures were in the morning when things looked rather bleak.
This one shows the fire coming over the ridge on the front of Trash


Workhorse of the fire deprtment (Sky Crane)


Foothills in front of the volcano ablaze!


The LZ goes up. This is when Joe and I were in the thick of it. All along we thought we may get it until this happened


It starts all over again, wiping any gains that were previously tackled.


Our warrior "guy"