Actually, even the Southern California media isn't really covering the San Bernardino fires, so I'm not surprised if nobody outside of the state has heard either. *wry smile*
But in case your news mentions it, yes, downtown San Bernardino has had some blazes since yesterday; I was actually on the freeway when the freeway fire started up again, and got to see palm trees go up in flames about 15 feet away from me (and I could feel the heat—it felt like I was sitting too close to a campfire). By that point we were turned around, slowly getting off by driving the wrong direction down an on-ramp. The wind was going pretty strong, and blowing the fire right down the sides of the freeway, so lots of smoke and ash around us. Couldn't see anything in my rear-view mirror but thick smoke, and I even had to put out a flying leaf ember with my windshield wipers and fluid! It was definitely a crazy adventure. It happened fast enough that traffic wasn't too bad yet on the streets just off the freeway, so once I was off the freeway I was able to find an alternate route home pretty quickly.
Little Mountain, the really big hill between our house and downtown, did catch fire too, early this morning; that, if you remember, was part of what burned last fall. Because people who live on the hill were evacuated, Cal State closed for the day (but Josh, who does 98% of his work on the road in the fall, is still traveling today), and there are lots of road closures. But other than that, and the fact that I need to hose the ash off of our car, we're fine. :-)
Welcome to the windy season in Southern California!
4 comments:
I read about fires in the Angeles National Forest a couple days ago and was thinking about checking in with Josh, but it appeared that they were closer to San Fernando. I'm glad you are OK.
Thanks Brian! Yeah, San Fernando was where two really big fires were, and the others were farther south. Because our fires were comparatively smaller, and we're not big-city L.A., we don't get as much coverage usually. Last year Josh had a freeway fire experience, too, and thankfully, that's about as exciting as it usually gets for us with the fires.
Oh my word--I'm so glad you're okay! How scary!
So Geneil, would you say that this experience got you "fired up" to get home on Monday? :-p
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