Mary and I love where we live, just inside the Angeles National Forrest, in Azusa, CA. Unfortunately, we live in the “fire zone.” This past Monday, we evacuated as the Fish Fire and Reservoir Fire exploded around us. We always take our cameras, as you never know what you will see. Here are a few photos from our week holed up in a hotel, including a massive and dramatic retardant drop by a DC-10 Supertanker.
The Reservoir Fire started north of us and mostly moved away from our home. The Fish Fire started west of us above Duarte and Monrovia and slowly burned east and north toward us. The Forest Service merged these two fires under a single incident command called the San Gabriel Complex Fire. We had a pretty good view from the Embassy Suites in Arcadia.
The terrain in the San Gabriel Mountains is very steep and it is hard to get fire crews on the ground. The only option is to let the fire burn itself out and to lay retardant down to protect homes and set down a perimeter.
The largest plane in the fleet is a specially designed DC-10. I saw it for a few days and then it was off to another fire in Kern County, burning right now.
The good news is we got back into our home after 4 nights and the San Gabriel Complex fire is about 50% contained. There are still many helicopters in the area making water drops.
Luckily, and with a lot of hard work from fire and police authorities, there were no lost structures or lives in this fire. We appreciate what the forest service and fire authorities did.
To see more of (and buy) our photographs, please go to www.pamphotography.com.
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