Overcast and some ground fog this early Friday on California’s north coast as we attempt to slide right into the weekend without too much crap — weather up here has tended back to the normal with early-morning mist to afternoon sunshine.
And it’s still fairly warm, but nothing like the south-end of the state.
Soaking up some rays ain’t nothing like this: An extreme heat wave is bringing sizzling temperatures to SoCal beaches where temps were expected to rise above those of infamously, hot and dry, Death Valley.
Readings were 10 to 20 degrees above the normal — but frickin’ Death Valley?
And with heat, comes the fire.
(Illustration found here).
Across southern California, more than 10,000 acres have scorched the region since Tuesday and it’s way-away from being finished — Thursday afternoon an 18-unit apartment complex and at least seven houses have been destroyed (yesterday afternoon!) with more fires growing as the sharp Santa Anna winds whip the flames. People are escaping in the nick…
Rebecca Kuritz, 35, was at home with her 15-year-old son Wednesday afternoon when she realized there was a fire headed straight toward their San Marcos complex.
“People were running out of our complex,” Kuritz said. “Running.”
She grabbed her son and left with only one shoe on.
“I’ve lost enough stuff in my life, I just wanted to get out of there,” Kuritz said.
“It’s just stressful. You realize what’s really important really quick.”
Making matters worse, some of this shit might be the work of arsonists — yesterday, authorities in northern San Diego County arrested a couple of youngsters (one, 19, the other, 17) on charges of attempting to start fires. One wonders at the asshole thinking in this shit. The problem is the way-dry.
Via the LA Times:
Firefighters responded to nearly three dozen fires Wednesday and are still battling eight active blazes in Southern California, seven of them in San Diego County, which combined have charred more than 10,000 acres, he said.
“Already this year, Cal Fire has responded to an over 100% increase in the number of wildfires than average,” Berlant said. (Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant)
The fires were more proof that California’s drought conditions have created a year-round fire season.
“It starts with the drought,” Berlant said.
“The grass, the brush and the trees — not only in San Diego County, really across California — are really dry.”
And yesterday, reports that the entire state — 100 percent — have finally hit the upper-bad-rugs of drought.
“Things are not trending in the right direction,” Mark Svoboda, a scientist at the National Drought Mitigation Center, told Climate Central.
This week, the situation became worse, with 100 percent of the state now in the three worst stages of drought.
It’s the first time that has occurred since the inception of the Drought Monitor in 2000.
Exceptional drought, the highest stage, runs from Los Angeles to San Francisco and inland to the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains.
A heat wave that descended on the state this week, sending temperatures into the triple digits and setting records in some places, is likely to only make matters worse.
“The heat will exacerbate and accelerate the impact concerns that come with higher demand (for water) and increased fire risk during such heat waves,” Svoboda said in an email.
…
The situation in California is unlikely to improve or change much over the summer, which is the dry season for most of the state.
Officials are hoping that an El Nino that is expected to develop this summer will bring the return of rains in the cooler season and alleviate water woes.
California isn’t the only dry part of the U.S. Another major drought spanning the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma, as well as parts of Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico is also still firmly in place.
“Drought is really intensifying pretty rapidly in the Southern Plains,” Jake Crouch, a climate scientist with NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, told Climate Central.
And in the midst of fires, heat and running away, we don’t need this:
According to new numbers compiled by the National Weather Service Employees Organization, the service currently has a staggering 548 vacancies — that’s nearly 15 percent of its staff positions empty.
Even more troubling, after this spring’s rash of deadly tornadoes and with hurricane season right around the corner, 396 of those unfilled spots are “emergency essential.”
In other words, there is a serious shortage of the people who have to go to work when the rest of us are scrambling to get home before severe weather strikes.
These unstaffed position include meteorologists, hydrologists and technicians.
“Some of the vacancies have lasted more than a year,” Bill Hopkins, the union’s executive vice president, told Energy&Environment Daily.
“These positions are labeled ‘Emergency Essential’ because they are critical to the agency’s lifesaving mission. … To have a long-standing vacancy is playing roulette with the weather.”
Another long, hot summer ahead for humanity.