Wednesday, November 19
5 years old and she dribbles...better then you!
This has nothing to do with fire prevention. But OMG watch this little girl do her thing...and then realize, you are probably not worthy! lol. Enjoy!
Tuesday, November 18
FOXNews.com - Tough fire standards pay off in Calif. subdivision - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News
FOXNews.com - Tough fire standards pay off in Calif. subdivision - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News
BREA, Calif. — The hillsides ringing the luxury development of Olinda Ranch are blackened, but the neatly tended stucco homes are intact. Fickle wind direction helped, but so did stringent fire-resistant construction and landscaping standards.
Increasingly, new construction in tinderbox regions of Southern California are built with "shelter-in-place" techniques designed to allow people to stay safely in their homes if they can't escape flames.
At Olinda Ranch, what look from afar like tile roofs actually are concrete. The eaves on the 3,500-square-foot homes are boxed in so wind-whipped embers can't lodge and send the whole house up in flames. Outside, brush can't be too close to the structure. Inside, sprinklers sit above every room and in the hallways.
The construction boosted the confidence of residents like Linda Johnson, who on Saturday watched nervously as flames edged toward the 6-year-old neighborhood of 660 homes.
By dawn Sunday, Johnson was out driving, checking the scene with a friend and her bichon frise, Teddy Bear. She glittered in the morning sun, having had donned all her diamonds in case she needed to flee. Instead, she spent an anxious night in her house.
"It's your home, it's your life, it's your history," Johnson said. "It's just really hard to walk away from that."
Tony Ross also stayed put. He owns a fire extinguisher company, so he knows a little about flames.
"After last night, I know all about it," he said.
He could smile because, save for a scattering of ash that he continued to hose down, his house was fine.
Ross said one of the threatening fires started on the hillside right beyond his back yard, where idle white metal oil derricks, relics from when the area was an oil boomtown, now stand in stark contrast to the charred ground.
He was preparing to pressure-wash his side path when he heard a boom. Soon he saw flames. Raging Santa Ana winds pushed the flames across the hillside so fast that they only blackened the few trees _ the fire wasn't there long enough to engulf them.
Ross' wife left, but he stayed. During the night, flames from another fire started to bear down from the east but stopped on the development's edge, thanks to crews that worked through the night. Behind them, those flames engulfed several homes in a canyon that connects eastern Orange County with western San Bernardino County.
When wildfires ravaged San Diego County a year ago, the community of Rancho Santa Fe was largely unscathed even though it was in the midst of some of the worst flames. The suburb lost 53 houses, but none in the five subdivisions that embraced "shelter-in-place" restrictions.
Rancho Santa Fe and Olinda Ranch stood in stark contrast to the Oakridge Mobile Home Park, a neatly kept community of modular homes in the San Fernando Valley in northern Los Angeles. A fire whipped by 70-mph Santa Ana winds wiped out 500 homes early Saturday. Unlike Olinda Ranch, the grounds of Oakridge were filled with flammable cypress and eucalyptus trees that lit up like torches.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger toured the burned-out community Sunday and said it's evidence that new construction techniques are sorely needed.
"We should start thinking about building ... mobile homes with the same fire-retardant materials" as modern subdivisions, he said.
BREA, Calif. — The hillsides ringing the luxury development of Olinda Ranch are blackened, but the neatly tended stucco homes are intact. Fickle wind direction helped, but so did stringent fire-resistant construction and landscaping standards.
Increasingly, new construction in tinderbox regions of Southern California are built with "shelter-in-place" techniques designed to allow people to stay safely in their homes if they can't escape flames.
At Olinda Ranch, what look from afar like tile roofs actually are concrete. The eaves on the 3,500-square-foot homes are boxed in so wind-whipped embers can't lodge and send the whole house up in flames. Outside, brush can't be too close to the structure. Inside, sprinklers sit above every room and in the hallways.
The construction boosted the confidence of residents like Linda Johnson, who on Saturday watched nervously as flames edged toward the 6-year-old neighborhood of 660 homes.
By dawn Sunday, Johnson was out driving, checking the scene with a friend and her bichon frise, Teddy Bear. She glittered in the morning sun, having had donned all her diamonds in case she needed to flee. Instead, she spent an anxious night in her house.
"It's your home, it's your life, it's your history," Johnson said. "It's just really hard to walk away from that."
Tony Ross also stayed put. He owns a fire extinguisher company, so he knows a little about flames.
"After last night, I know all about it," he said.
He could smile because, save for a scattering of ash that he continued to hose down, his house was fine.
Ross said one of the threatening fires started on the hillside right beyond his back yard, where idle white metal oil derricks, relics from when the area was an oil boomtown, now stand in stark contrast to the charred ground.
He was preparing to pressure-wash his side path when he heard a boom. Soon he saw flames. Raging Santa Ana winds pushed the flames across the hillside so fast that they only blackened the few trees _ the fire wasn't there long enough to engulf them.
Ross' wife left, but he stayed. During the night, flames from another fire started to bear down from the east but stopped on the development's edge, thanks to crews that worked through the night. Behind them, those flames engulfed several homes in a canyon that connects eastern Orange County with western San Bernardino County.
When wildfires ravaged San Diego County a year ago, the community of Rancho Santa Fe was largely unscathed even though it was in the midst of some of the worst flames. The suburb lost 53 houses, but none in the five subdivisions that embraced "shelter-in-place" restrictions.
Rancho Santa Fe and Olinda Ranch stood in stark contrast to the Oakridge Mobile Home Park, a neatly kept community of modular homes in the San Fernando Valley in northern Los Angeles. A fire whipped by 70-mph Santa Ana winds wiped out 500 homes early Saturday. Unlike Olinda Ranch, the grounds of Oakridge were filled with flammable cypress and eucalyptus trees that lit up like torches.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger toured the burned-out community Sunday and said it's evidence that new construction techniques are sorely needed.
"We should start thinking about building ... mobile homes with the same fire-retardant materials" as modern subdivisions, he said.
Monday, November 17
Water pressure hampered Yorba Linda fire fight | L.A. Now | Los Angeles Times
Water pressure hampered Yorba Linda fire fight | L.A. Now | Los Angeles Times
Orange County Fire Capt. Bill Lockhart said the fire crew he was working with Saturday afternoon in Yorba Linda had difficulties with water pressure.
On Fairmont Boulevard about 5 p.m. Saturday, he said, "We had a 'dry hydrant', where we hooked up to it and nothing came out." So the crew moved along to the next available hydrant, which worked. "It delayed things a bit, but we were able to make it happen," he said.
Speaking to a resident of Big Horn Mountain Way, whose Yorba Linda home was destroyed and who voiced concerns about reports of poor water pressure, Lockhart also gave a general explanation of the problem.
"Typically the pressure is good if we're fighting a fire at one single family home," he said. "But when we have a profound incident, when there's multiple demands, not everything works right."
Lockhart said calling the local water district would also reveal what sort of water pressure problems they were dealing with Saturday.
--Tony Barboza
Orange County Fire Capt. Bill Lockhart said the fire crew he was working with Saturday afternoon in Yorba Linda had difficulties with water pressure.
On Fairmont Boulevard about 5 p.m. Saturday, he said, "We had a 'dry hydrant', where we hooked up to it and nothing came out." So the crew moved along to the next available hydrant, which worked. "It delayed things a bit, but we were able to make it happen," he said.
Speaking to a resident of Big Horn Mountain Way, whose Yorba Linda home was destroyed and who voiced concerns about reports of poor water pressure, Lockhart also gave a general explanation of the problem.
"Typically the pressure is good if we're fighting a fire at one single family home," he said. "But when we have a profound incident, when there's multiple demands, not everything works right."
Lockhart said calling the local water district would also reveal what sort of water pressure problems they were dealing with Saturday.
--Tony Barboza
Friday, November 14
3 Chicago teens drown during leadership retreat | National news | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
3 Chicago teens drown during leadership retreat | National news | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
ALGONQUIN, Ill. — Three Chicago teens who apparently sneaked away from a school-sponsored camp retreat to paddle along a nearby river drowned early Friday. Their paddle boats — missing floor plugs already removed for the winter — quickly took on water and sank.
Chaperones at the leadership retreat were likely asleep when a group of students launched four or five paddle boats into the Fox River, said John Greene, battalion chief of the Algonquin-Lake in the Hills Fire Protection District.
It was not clear how many teens ended up in the water.
"Shenanigans," Greene said. "That's what it looks like."
McHenry County coroner's office identified one of the students as 17-year-old Melvin Choice. Authorities have not released the identities of the other two.
Two of the boys were seniors and one was a junior at North Lawndale College Prep, a charter school on Chicago's West Side, said Julie Didier, a spokeswoman for the fire protection district.
Police responded at 2 a.m. to a 911 call that three teens were reported missing.
Authorities said after one boat quickly took on water, two boys on the shore went into the river to try to rescue a student, but soon they too went missing.
Robert Williams said his son was on the shore and unsuccessfully tried to swim toward the boys.
"He did all he could to try to save them, but he couldn't do it," Williams said.
The boats on the river were taken out of service for the season by having their bottom plugs removed, Didier said.
A total of 31 students were participating in the eight-day retreat at Camp Algonquin that was to end Friday. Officials say there were four chaperones, all of them teachers from North Lawndale, which has not responded to telephone calls for comment.
ALGONQUIN, Ill. — Three Chicago teens who apparently sneaked away from a school-sponsored camp retreat to paddle along a nearby river drowned early Friday. Their paddle boats — missing floor plugs already removed for the winter — quickly took on water and sank.
Chaperones at the leadership retreat were likely asleep when a group of students launched four or five paddle boats into the Fox River, said John Greene, battalion chief of the Algonquin-Lake in the Hills Fire Protection District.
It was not clear how many teens ended up in the water.
"Shenanigans," Greene said. "That's what it looks like."
McHenry County coroner's office identified one of the students as 17-year-old Melvin Choice. Authorities have not released the identities of the other two.
Two of the boys were seniors and one was a junior at North Lawndale College Prep, a charter school on Chicago's West Side, said Julie Didier, a spokeswoman for the fire protection district.
Police responded at 2 a.m. to a 911 call that three teens were reported missing.
Authorities said after one boat quickly took on water, two boys on the shore went into the river to try to rescue a student, but soon they too went missing.
Robert Williams said his son was on the shore and unsuccessfully tried to swim toward the boys.
"He did all he could to try to save them, but he couldn't do it," Williams said.
The boats on the river were taken out of service for the season by having their bottom plugs removed, Didier said.
A total of 31 students were participating in the eight-day retreat at Camp Algonquin that was to end Friday. Officials say there were four chaperones, all of them teachers from North Lawndale, which has not responded to telephone calls for comment.
Fire destroys 100+ homes, injures 4 in SoCal town - Yahoo! News
Fire destroys 100+ homes, injures 4 in SoCal town - Yahoo! News
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – Firefighters were racing early Friday to push back a wind-whipped wildfire that destroyed at least 100 homes and a college dormitory, injured four people and forced thousands to flee the longtime celebrity hideaway of Montecito.
The fire broke out just before 6 p.m. Thursday and spread to about 2,500 acres — nearly 4 square miles — by early Friday, destroying dozens of luxury homes and parts of a college campus in the foothills of Montecito, just southeast of Santa Barbara. About 5,400 homes in the tony community of 14,000 residents were evacuated and more people could be forced to flee if the fire spreads, said Nicole Koon, a spokeswoman with the Santa Barbara County Executive Office.
"We believe 100 plus homes have been destroyed," Koon said. "It's our best guess at the moment because it's dark. We're not counting as much as trying to protect the homes."
At Westmont College, a Christian liberal arts college nestled amid wooded rolling hills, some 1,000 students were caught off-guard by the rapidly moving flames.
(click the link above for the rest of the story)
Thursday, November 13
A Depression-Style California State Budget - California Progress Report
A Depression-Style California State Budget - California Progress Report
As the ongoing horror show that is the daily financial news continues to lurch from one gut-wrenching revelation to another, and journalists and commentators increasingly compare the current financial crisis to the Great Depression of the 1930s, it is time look at some facets of that earlier era to gain an insight into what the folks in Sacramento could be up against.
The current crisis, which started in the real estate sector, is now expanding across the economy, and it appears that no market is safe. Starting with the crash in auction-rate securities, state and locals bonds became vulnerable as well as government pension funds. CalPERS’s investment portfolio is estimated to be down 20 per cent.
Across the country states are cutting back cost-of living adjustments and general benefits while asking contributors to up their contribution to the various funds. Debt at all levels continues to increase and not just in California. New Jersey’s outstanding debt increased 6 percent this year and has tripled in the past decade. Municipal bond prices are crashing in Michigan. New York City is rolling back a property tax cut and cutting 3,000 workers to plug a $4 billion deficit.
In California, the accumulated deficit in the next 18 months is expected to be in the range of $25 billion, with another $20 billion from 2010 onward. The new Legislative Analyst has declared that the state’s financial situation can not be solved by just spending cuts or tax increases—it will take both. No wonder Governor Schwarzenegger is eying a job in the Obama administration to get out from under this mess.
But just how bad could things get, and what could we really be looking at if the state has to confront a depression-style budget? One of the most famous episodes from that era in California was the 1931 threat by movie mogul Louis B. Mayer to have the state exempt theater tickets from sales tax or the studios would move out of state. The threat worked. That is why there is no sales tax on theater tickets today. Also in 1931, Nevada legalized gambling to avoid going bankrupt.
But other stories probably convey the level of desperation of those times more personally. Like the famous Literary Digest presidential poll in 1936, which showed Alf Landon defeating Franklin D Roosevelt when in fact, Roosevelt won in one of the greatest political landslides in US history. The reason for the skewed poll was that it was an early telephone poll, and in 1936, only well-to-do Republicans supporting Landon could afford telephones. In my father’s family, the telephone service was disconnected, just as it was in many households. A recent story on the Depression in the Washington Post discussed how the Depression first entered American households, such as the day people switched from electric lighting to cheaper kerosene lamps, the day beans replaced beef on the dinner table, and the day extended family members moved in. The most grisly story in the article was in 1932 in Detroit, when the city shut down its zoo and slaughtered its animals to provide food for a starving population.
Now it is hard to conceive of such an appalling event happening at a California zoo today, but what all these Depression-era moments convey is how things we take for granted simply disappeared and how radically for the worse life changed for Americans at that time. The country of the late 1940s would have been almost unrecognizable to people of the 1920s. In fact, people of the 1950s have more in common with people of today than they did to people of just a few years earlier— the change brought on by the Depression and World War II was that great.
This is what awaits Americans of this era and the state budget. The governor and the legislators will be faced with making decisions that would have been inconceivable just a year ago for a state that in a few years will be unrecognizable to its current inhabitants. As the Democratic legislators convene in Sacramento, they, along with their Republican opponents, will have to determine which items will be the equivalent of the 1932 Detroit Zoo in the 2009 California budget. Let’s hope that the financial carnage will not be as gruesome as the animal carnage was seventy-five years ago.
As the ongoing horror show that is the daily financial news continues to lurch from one gut-wrenching revelation to another, and journalists and commentators increasingly compare the current financial crisis to the Great Depression of the 1930s, it is time look at some facets of that earlier era to gain an insight into what the folks in Sacramento could be up against.
The current crisis, which started in the real estate sector, is now expanding across the economy, and it appears that no market is safe. Starting with the crash in auction-rate securities, state and locals bonds became vulnerable as well as government pension funds. CalPERS’s investment portfolio is estimated to be down 20 per cent.
Across the country states are cutting back cost-of living adjustments and general benefits while asking contributors to up their contribution to the various funds. Debt at all levels continues to increase and not just in California. New Jersey’s outstanding debt increased 6 percent this year and has tripled in the past decade. Municipal bond prices are crashing in Michigan. New York City is rolling back a property tax cut and cutting 3,000 workers to plug a $4 billion deficit.
In California, the accumulated deficit in the next 18 months is expected to be in the range of $25 billion, with another $20 billion from 2010 onward. The new Legislative Analyst has declared that the state’s financial situation can not be solved by just spending cuts or tax increases—it will take both. No wonder Governor Schwarzenegger is eying a job in the Obama administration to get out from under this mess.
But just how bad could things get, and what could we really be looking at if the state has to confront a depression-style budget? One of the most famous episodes from that era in California was the 1931 threat by movie mogul Louis B. Mayer to have the state exempt theater tickets from sales tax or the studios would move out of state. The threat worked. That is why there is no sales tax on theater tickets today. Also in 1931, Nevada legalized gambling to avoid going bankrupt.
But other stories probably convey the level of desperation of those times more personally. Like the famous Literary Digest presidential poll in 1936, which showed Alf Landon defeating Franklin D Roosevelt when in fact, Roosevelt won in one of the greatest political landslides in US history. The reason for the skewed poll was that it was an early telephone poll, and in 1936, only well-to-do Republicans supporting Landon could afford telephones. In my father’s family, the telephone service was disconnected, just as it was in many households. A recent story on the Depression in the Washington Post discussed how the Depression first entered American households, such as the day people switched from electric lighting to cheaper kerosene lamps, the day beans replaced beef on the dinner table, and the day extended family members moved in. The most grisly story in the article was in 1932 in Detroit, when the city shut down its zoo and slaughtered its animals to provide food for a starving population.
Now it is hard to conceive of such an appalling event happening at a California zoo today, but what all these Depression-era moments convey is how things we take for granted simply disappeared and how radically for the worse life changed for Americans at that time. The country of the late 1940s would have been almost unrecognizable to people of the 1920s. In fact, people of the 1950s have more in common with people of today than they did to people of just a few years earlier— the change brought on by the Depression and World War II was that great.
This is what awaits Americans of this era and the state budget. The governor and the legislators will be faced with making decisions that would have been inconceivable just a year ago for a state that in a few years will be unrecognizable to its current inhabitants. As the Democratic legislators convene in Sacramento, they, along with their Republican opponents, will have to determine which items will be the equivalent of the 1932 Detroit Zoo in the 2009 California budget. Let’s hope that the financial carnage will not be as gruesome as the animal carnage was seventy-five years ago.
Budget Cuts Threaten Over 250,000 Community College Students
Budget Cuts Threaten Over 250,000 Community College Students
SACRAMENTO, CA Nov. 13, 2008 - Budget cuts proposed last week will cause community colleges to turn away 262,845 current students if implemented, analysis released today by the Community College League of California shows. The loss of a quarter of a million students is the equivalent of closing the University of California.
The state's rising unemployment rate and decisions by the California State University to limit enrollment will likely lead to even more students finding the doors to higher education closed.
California's community colleges are seeing skyrocketing enrollments as Californians return to college amid high unemployment to retrain for the changing economy. The Department of Finance is now estimating that another 400,000 Californians will be jobless by 2010 as the unemployment increases from 7.7% to 9.7%.
Meanwhile, a poll released today by the Public Policy Institute of California finds that 66% of Californians believe community colleges are doing an "excellent" or "good" job, putting the two-year colleges on par with the California State University and University of California. However, 83% of the public is concerned that the state's budget gap will cause significant spending cuts in higher education, and 68% believe that more funding is needed to provide "major improvements" to California's higher education system.
"California's community colleges are our state's best economic stimulus," said Scott Lay, president and chief executive officer of the Community College League of California. "We must decide now to make the investment needed to emerge from this downturn with a more equipped and knowledgeable workforce that translates into quality jobs for our taxpayers and a stronger economy."
With 110 accredited colleges and more than 200 locations throughout California, community colleges serve over 1.7 million students each term from nearly every community in the state.
The Community College League of California is a nonprofit public benefit corporation whose voluntary membership consists of the 72 local community college districts in California. The League promotes student access and success by strengthening colleges through leadership development, advocacy, policy development and district services.
Estimated Impact of Proposed Special Session Cuts
District Projected Impact
Allan Hancock $2,800,000
Antelope Valley $3,300,000
Barstow $900,000
Butte $3,100,000
Cabrillo $3,500,000
Cerritos $4,900,000
Chabot-Las Positas $5,100,000
Chaffey $4,300,000
Citrus $3,300,000
Coast $10,300,000
Compton $1,100,000
Contra Costa $9,200,000
Copper Mt. $600,000
Desert $2,300,000
El Camino $5,900,000
Feather River $600,000
Foothill-DeAnza $9,600,000
Gavilan $1,600,000
Glendale $4,500,000
Grossmont-Cuyamaca $5,400,000
Hartnell $2,000,000
Imperial $2,000,000
Kern $6,100,000
Lake Tahoe $700,000
Lassen $600,000
Long Beach $6,200,000
Los Angeles $29,900,000
Los Rios $15,400,000
Marin Local tax sustaining
Mendocino-Lake $1,000,000
Merced $2,900,000
Mira Costa Local tax sustaining
Monterey Peninsula $2,300,000
Mt. San Antonio $8,100,000
Mt. San Jacinto $3,100,000
Napa Valley $1,800,000
North Orange County $9,500,000
Ohlone $2,600,000
Palo Verde $700,000
Palomar $5,600,000
Pasadena Area $6,500,000
Peralta $6,100,000
Rancho Santiago $8,300,000
Redwoods $1,600,000
Rio Hondo $3,800,000
Riverside $7,900,000
San Bernardino $4,100,000
San Diego $11,700,000
San Francisco $10,000,000
San Joaquin Delta $4,700,000
San Jose-Evergreen $4,500,000
San Luis Obispo $2,800,000
San Mateo $5,600,000
Santa Barbara $4,500,000
Santa Clarita $4,300,000
Santa Monica $5,600,000
Sequoias $2,400,000
Shasta-Tehama-Trinity $2,200,000
Sierra $4,500,000
Siskiyou $900,000
Solano $2,700,000
Sonoma $5,800,000
South Orange Local tax sustaining
Southwestern $4,600,000
State Center $8,000,000
Ventura $7,900,000
Victor Valley $2,800,000
West Hills $1,800,000
West Kern $1,200,000
West Valley-Mission $4,800,000
Yosemite $5,000,000
Yuba $2,500,000
Total: $332,200,000
* Based on 2007-08 Second Principle Apportionment. Actual amounts would vary based on final calculations.
Estimated Impact of Proposed Special Session Cuts
** Local tax sustaining districts do not receive general support from the state and thus would not be included in a reduction
in cost-of-living adjustment or general
SACRAMENTO, CA Nov. 13, 2008 - Budget cuts proposed last week will cause community colleges to turn away 262,845 current students if implemented, analysis released today by the Community College League of California shows. The loss of a quarter of a million students is the equivalent of closing the University of California.
The state's rising unemployment rate and decisions by the California State University to limit enrollment will likely lead to even more students finding the doors to higher education closed.
California's community colleges are seeing skyrocketing enrollments as Californians return to college amid high unemployment to retrain for the changing economy. The Department of Finance is now estimating that another 400,000 Californians will be jobless by 2010 as the unemployment increases from 7.7% to 9.7%.
Meanwhile, a poll released today by the Public Policy Institute of California finds that 66% of Californians believe community colleges are doing an "excellent" or "good" job, putting the two-year colleges on par with the California State University and University of California. However, 83% of the public is concerned that the state's budget gap will cause significant spending cuts in higher education, and 68% believe that more funding is needed to provide "major improvements" to California's higher education system.
"California's community colleges are our state's best economic stimulus," said Scott Lay, president and chief executive officer of the Community College League of California. "We must decide now to make the investment needed to emerge from this downturn with a more equipped and knowledgeable workforce that translates into quality jobs for our taxpayers and a stronger economy."
With 110 accredited colleges and more than 200 locations throughout California, community colleges serve over 1.7 million students each term from nearly every community in the state.
The Community College League of California is a nonprofit public benefit corporation whose voluntary membership consists of the 72 local community college districts in California. The League promotes student access and success by strengthening colleges through leadership development, advocacy, policy development and district services.
Estimated Impact of Proposed Special Session Cuts
District Projected Impact
Allan Hancock $2,800,000
Antelope Valley $3,300,000
Barstow $900,000
Butte $3,100,000
Cabrillo $3,500,000
Cerritos $4,900,000
Chabot-Las Positas $5,100,000
Chaffey $4,300,000
Citrus $3,300,000
Coast $10,300,000
Compton $1,100,000
Contra Costa $9,200,000
Copper Mt. $600,000
Desert $2,300,000
El Camino $5,900,000
Feather River $600,000
Foothill-DeAnza $9,600,000
Gavilan $1,600,000
Glendale $4,500,000
Grossmont-Cuyamaca $5,400,000
Hartnell $2,000,000
Imperial $2,000,000
Kern $6,100,000
Lake Tahoe $700,000
Lassen $600,000
Long Beach $6,200,000
Los Angeles $29,900,000
Los Rios $15,400,000
Marin Local tax sustaining
Mendocino-Lake $1,000,000
Merced $2,900,000
Mira Costa Local tax sustaining
Monterey Peninsula $2,300,000
Mt. San Antonio $8,100,000
Mt. San Jacinto $3,100,000
Napa Valley $1,800,000
North Orange County $9,500,000
Ohlone $2,600,000
Palo Verde $700,000
Palomar $5,600,000
Pasadena Area $6,500,000
Peralta $6,100,000
Rancho Santiago $8,300,000
Redwoods $1,600,000
Rio Hondo $3,800,000
Riverside $7,900,000
San Bernardino $4,100,000
San Diego $11,700,000
San Francisco $10,000,000
San Joaquin Delta $4,700,000
San Jose-Evergreen $4,500,000
San Luis Obispo $2,800,000
San Mateo $5,600,000
Santa Barbara $4,500,000
Santa Clarita $4,300,000
Santa Monica $5,600,000
Sequoias $2,400,000
Shasta-Tehama-Trinity $2,200,000
Sierra $4,500,000
Siskiyou $900,000
Solano $2,700,000
Sonoma $5,800,000
South Orange Local tax sustaining
Southwestern $4,600,000
State Center $8,000,000
Ventura $7,900,000
Victor Valley $2,800,000
West Hills $1,800,000
West Kern $1,200,000
West Valley-Mission $4,800,000
Yosemite $5,000,000
Yuba $2,500,000
Total: $332,200,000
* Based on 2007-08 Second Principle Apportionment. Actual amounts would vary based on final calculations.
Estimated Impact of Proposed Special Session Cuts
** Local tax sustaining districts do not receive general support from the state and thus would not be included in a reduction
in cost-of-living adjustment or general
Gunpowder blast shrouds Tokyo in smoke - Telegraph
Gunpowder blast shrouds Tokyo in smoke - Telegraph
Teams of firemen battled to get the blaze under control after it destroyed two buildings and left four other people injured, officials at the Tokyo Fire Department said.
Shinichi Yokoyama, 60, who was among the injured, said the blast occurred when he was mixing gunpowder, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported.
His company supplies explosives for gunfire scenes in film and television productions and stores its product in quantity at its business premises in downtown Tokyo.
About 60 fire engines and more than 100 firemen rushed to the scene to fight back the flames and hose down the smoking buildings, the fire department said.
Plumes of smoke could be seen from several miles away some time after the accident.
Explosions at gunpowder and fireworks factories are not common in Japan, but in China - where manufacturing standards are not as stringent - there have been dozens of incidents in recent years. They have often resulted in a high number of deaths.
Jilted lover accidentally blows up building - Yahoo! News
Jilted lover accidentally blows up building - Yahoo! News
BERLIN (Reuters) – A German charged with murder for causing a gas explosion that destroyed half an apartment building and killed his neighbor, told a court Wednesday he was only trying to kill himself because he was lovesick.
The 22-year old on trial in Moenchengladbach, western Germany, said he had opened the natural gas taps in his apartment intending to commit suicide after his girlfriend broke up with him by phone.
When the 17-year old later arrived to pick her belongings up from his flat, she unwittingly lit a cigarette which ignited the gas and blew up half of the building, injuring 15 people and killing a 45-year old neighbor.
The 22-year-old man and his ex-girlfriend survived the blast. Ralf Wolters, a court spokesman, said the man said he did not realize there was a risk of explosion.
Wolters said the 22-year-old was charged with murder, attempted murder and grievous bodily harm.
(Reporting by Josie Cox; Editing by Matthew Jones)
BERLIN (Reuters) – A German charged with murder for causing a gas explosion that destroyed half an apartment building and killed his neighbor, told a court Wednesday he was only trying to kill himself because he was lovesick.
The 22-year old on trial in Moenchengladbach, western Germany, said he had opened the natural gas taps in his apartment intending to commit suicide after his girlfriend broke up with him by phone.
When the 17-year old later arrived to pick her belongings up from his flat, she unwittingly lit a cigarette which ignited the gas and blew up half of the building, injuring 15 people and killing a 45-year old neighbor.
The 22-year-old man and his ex-girlfriend survived the blast. Ralf Wolters, a court spokesman, said the man said he did not realize there was a risk of explosion.
Wolters said the 22-year-old was charged with murder, attempted murder and grievous bodily harm.
(Reporting by Josie Cox; Editing by Matthew Jones)
Wednesday, September 17
SAC Fire Tech Club
Check out the website for our NEW Fire Tech club at www.sacfiretechclub.blogspot.com
For Los Angeles Firefighters at Collision, Heroism and Reality Collide
For Los Angeles Firefighters at Collision, Heroism and Reality Collide - Firehouse.com News ROBERT J. LOPEZ, GARRETT THEROLF and SCOTT GOLD
Los Angeles Times
There was spaghetti on the stove at Fire Station 96 when the loudspeaker crackled. Right before dinner. Typical.
"Possible physical rescue," the dispatcher said. In firefighter-speak, it was a run-of-the-mill call that gets the emergency response rolling but usually translates into little more than a car wreck. The voice was cold, detached -- numb from the job, perhaps, but also trained to keep emotion at bay.
Los Angeles Fire Capt. Alan Barrios, a brawny, soft-spoken man and a father of three who has been in the business for 32 of his 54 years, climbed aboard his rig with two firefighters and an engineer, his entire engine company. Among the four of them, they'd been on the line for 77 years.
Four minutes after the call, just before 4:30 p.m. Friday, they pulled up to the Chatsworth house where a resident had called 911, at the end of Heather Lee Lane. Barrios could see the smoke now. He sprinted to the back of the house and stared through a chain-link fence. This was no car wreck.
"We are on scene," Barrios barked into his radio. "We have a train collision."
The rescue effort that would unfold from that moment would involve hundreds of firefighters, law enforcement officers and others and would shock the senses of even the most hardened veterans.
By Saturday, as the death toll rose to 25, two parallel narratives had emerged from the mangled cars.
There had been moments of astonishing heroism. An off-duty Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy who survived the crash helped numerous victims get out, despite a broken collarbone, a collapsed lung, a puncture wound in his thigh and a broken hand. Deputy John Ebert, 54, a court bailiff, was in critical but stable condition Saturday evening.
There had been moments of heartbreaking reality, too -- when rescue workers trying to tunnel their way through the wreckage encountered industrial-strength metal that broke their cutting tools; when firefighters were forced to face the fact that for some trapped inside, there was no hope.
And hope, Barrios would say later, "is what keeps us going."
First on the scene
Barrios and his crew cut through the fence and raced for the wreckage. The captain was on his radio as they approached.
The scene started to come into relief. Send five ambulances, he said at first. He got closer and saw the flames. Send 30 firetrucks, he added. Then he was there. The Metrolink engine seemed to be missing. In the head-on crash, a Union Pacific engine had shoved it violently inside the first passenger car, which was lying grotesquely on its side. Two dozen passengers had emerged from the wreckage; some, dazed, were walking in circles against a curtain of black smoke.
Barrios made his last request: Send every heavy search-and-rescue unit in the city.
Kevin Nagel, one of Barrios' firefighters, had helped lug in 600 feet of hose. He had his eye on two 1,000-gallon diesel tanks from the Union Pacific engine. "If those things blow," Nagel told himself, "we're going to lose a lot of people." He and another firefighter began beating back the flames.
Barrios began racing from car to car. More passengers were trying to climb free.
"I had a lot of people yelling at me -- about the fire, about the dead," he said. "They wanted to get out."
Barrios pleaded with them to stay inside. It will be easier to establish a triage center, he told them, if all victims are in one place. But there was a concession, too, in his message; he knew that until the cavalry arrived, he would need to enlist passengers who were relatively unscathed to assist with those who were worse off.
'Help me'
Battalion Chief Joe Castro, a 30-year veteran, arrived several minutes later. He was relaying his initial impressions on his radio when he felt a tug on his leg. It was a victim who had crawled out. Part of his skull was crushed. "Help me," the man said, and Castro did.
"It was the worst thing I'd ever seen," Castro said later.
With the fire under control, Nagel, now joined by several firefighters and a sheriff's deputy, found a door of the front passenger car, the one that absorbed the worst of the impact. "We didn't know what to expect," he said. He shouted inside: "We're right here! We're going to get you out!"
Nagel was no rookie; in his 18-year career he had responded to the Northridge earthquake in 1994, to the Glendale-area crash in 2005 that was, at the time, the deadliest in Metrolink history. But what he found inside, amid the smoke and crumpled metal, was devastating. He began to make dismal calculations. Two or three could be extracted quickly. Six or seven were dead.
"About eight or 10," Nagel said, "were alive but weren't going to make it."
Barrios lives in Moorpark; many of the crash victims, he figured, lived in his community. One man screamed for help; all they could see was his hand sticking out from under another passenger's body. Others were shouting: "Get me out! Get me out!"
"You know these people were going home to their families," Barrios said. "But they're not going home."
On one level, it wasn't a complex mission. "You've got to get them out of there and you've got to get them to the hospital," Barrios said. But he knew it would be more complicated than that.
'Organized chaos'
Rescuers pulled the first two victims out of the front car relatively easily, by throwing aside seats and pulling away wreckage with their hands. Saving anyone else -- even getting to anyone else -- would prove more difficult.
Only one other victim was even partly accessible, a man in his late 40s, his brown boots sticking out from the mangled seat that had trapped him. The man was able to speak, albeit softly because of the pressure on his chest. It took half an hour for rescue workers to cut through an air conditioning unit and a table to get him out, but that man was expected to survive.
It only got harder from there. At one point, the cutting tips of one crew's "jaws of life" broke as firefighters cut through sheets of high-density metal. They had to bring in special saws with diamond-tipped blades.
Not far away, officials were turning a school parking lot into an instant airport, with heliports, fuel trucks and the equivalent of an air-traffic control center.
Helicopters ferried dozens of people to hospitals as others landed with search-and-rescuers carrying "go kits" -- bags packed with lights, devices that allowed them to listen through walls for struggling victims, crowbars and hand-held jacks designed to peel apart distended metal.
The air was thick with the stench of fuel and the noise was deafening -- helicopters, trucks rumbling through the hills. Dogs scoured the cars, trying to find survivors. Rescuers hung powerful spotlights from cranes at dusk.
"It looked and sounded like it came out of a movie," said Searcy Jackson III, a firefighter who reported to the scene from Fire Station 88 in Sherman Oaks. "It didn't look real."
Rescuers went on "autopilot," said Los Angeles Police Assistant Chief Jim McDonnell. He described it as "organized chaos."
"There was so much to do in such a short time frame," McDonnell said. "The thing I'm left with is a tremendous tragedy, of course, but also an acknowledgment of the training and the relationship that exists among first responders. It was critical. And in this case it saved many lives."
Feverish work
They could not, of course, get to everyone in time.
Jackson, the firefighter from Sherman Oaks, arrived about half an hour after the crash and joined a crew that worked feverishly to free a man. At first, all they could see was his hand and part of his torso. Using saws, cutters and spreaders, they were able to wiggle him free.
"It seemed like it was going fast," Jackson said. "It was probably going slow."
When the man was finally freed from the wreckage, it was clear he was going to survive. He thanked the rescuers, but few other words were exchanged. The team moved on. Though Jackson was at the accident site for seven more hours, that man was the only survivor he helped extract.
"You never think you're going to come to a call like this," Jackson said.
Within a few hours of the initial call, the moaning inside the cars had faded away. The Engine 96 crewmen started thinking about their own families; Nagel thought of his wife and three kids.
"It puts a lot of perspective on the little world you're living in," he said.
On Saturday, part of the crew was back at the site, still searching for victims.
"Everybody's numb," Barrios said. "It takes a few days to know what you went through."
Related: California Train Crash Leaves 25 Dead, 138 Injured
Thursday, September 11
Mouth to Meow-th: Mass. firefighter revives cat
NEW BEDFORD, Mass. (AP) — A lucky cat owes one of its nine lives to a firefighter who revived it with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
Al Machado rescued the cat from a burning apartment Tuesday, telling The Standard Times of New Bedford that he saw immediately that it needed air. Machado began performing mouth to mouth on the animal as he carried it outside.
Video shot at the scene shows Machado bent over, breathing into the cat's mouth several times. The cat, a tiger angora, was revived and resting comfortably soon after.
No humans were injured in the fire. A man and woman whose last known address was the building that burned were arrested and charged with arson, authorities said.
Two other cats died in the second-floor apartment, but two dogs there were saved with the help of oxygen from paramedics and animal rescue personnel. Pets on the other two floors — including a ferret and even some frogs on the first floor — were all saved.
Asked what it tasted like to give mouth-to-mouth to a cat, Machado laughed, grimaced and said: "Like fur."
WTC 102 Minutes that Changed America
This interactive map presents unfiltered video captured by nine
different eyewitnesses from 10 locations around the World Trade
Center on the morning of September 11th.
Special Premiere
Thu. 9/11 @ 9pm/8C
In this commercial-free special, discover rarely seen and heard archives that document the 102 minutes between the first attack on the World Trade Center to the collapse of the second tower.
>> Watch a preview
Listen to radio broadcasts from regional radio stations as the events occurred on that tragic day.
Fire chief, Richard Picciotto, shares his amazing story of rescue and survival.
What is the master plan for Ground Zero? Hear what Daniel Libeskind envisions for the site.
Medical Device Recall: Physio Control, Inc. LifePak CR Plus Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs)
Audience: Emergency medical personnel, other healthcare professionals
Physio Control, Inc., issued a recall of LifePak CR Plus Automated External Defibrillators (AED), used by emergency or medical personnel to treat adults in cardiopulmonary arrest. The product was recalled because the AED instructs the responder by voice prompts to press the shock button which is not visible because it is covered, thereby making the responder unable to provide shock therapy. The AED device should be removed from service, or the manufacturer-provided diagram should be consulted to remove and discard the shock button cover.
Wednesday, September 3
President Martinez needs to be alarmed about fire system - Views
President Martinez needs to be alarmed about fire system - Views
As classes started last week, Santa Ana College still did not have a fully functional alarm system. Once again our students and faculty study and work in a facility where there is a potential for disaster.
Since last year when el Don brought the problem to the public’s attention, steps have been taken to fix the dilapidated system, and progress has been made. However, in July, a contractor was hired to bring SAC up to code and into the 21st century was fired before completing the job.
We now have an alarm system that will sound locally in all buildings except for the library, which is again on fire watch.
Nealley Library — housing an abundance of texts, periodicals and valuable documents that assist students in enriching their education — is susceptible to destruction. The fire watch system is dependent on an on duty observer to be present if a fire were to ignite.
Moreover, the now functioning alarms are not connected to campus safety or to the local fire department. In a situation where every second counts we are losing those moments to on some Johnny- on-the-spot to alert higher-ups of a serious problem.
In a year where more than 30,000 students are enrolled and have entrusted their future and safety to this institution, most are unaware of its structural inadequacies. So now we wait and hope for the best.
A project scheduled for completion this summer is now up for bid again. So, we just might have a new contractor by October, work just might begin two weeks later and it could be finished by April 2009. That, however, is a lot of ifs and buts.
We attend this place of higher learning for an education and hope of a better future. All we ask of our president and her staff is to make SAC a safe place. After all, we have been told that SAC is a family.
We urge President Martinez to complete the job quickly and properly as if it were
her own home and her own family were occupying it.
As long as all goes well and the fire alarm system is in place then this administration might be remembered for more than fire alarms. If the unthinkable were to happen they could be branded by a far worse moniker.
Family of man burned in car seeks apology from fire department
by John Tunison | The Grand Rapids Press HASTINGS -- The sight was horrific to Johnny Montes -- his father-in-law's scorched remains in the blackened shell of a burned car.
He cannot fathom how Hastings firefighters missed making the grim discovery when they extinguished the driveway car fire Friday morning, then cleared the scene after leaving a note on the door advising about insurance notifications.
"You couldn't miss it," an incredulous Montes said Tuesday. "There was no way of overlooking (the remains). There was no possible way."
The remains of Paul E. Bailey Sr., 62, were discovered in the driver's seat of a Monte Carlo by his daughter about 2 1/2 hours after the Hastings Fire Department left Bailey's home on Far Away Drive in Rutland Township.
Michigan State Police at the Hastings post are investigating the death as fire officials conduct an internal review of the incident, trying to determine how the remains were missed.
Fire Chief Roger Caris, who was not at the fire, defended his department Tuesday. He said a badly burned body, particularly one exposed to extreme heat and flames, might be difficult to recognize.
"The car was totally destroyed," Caris said.
Caris was told that firefighters did examine the car before leaving the scene and even tried to find the vehicle identification number. He believes they opened the car door to look inside.
"We always check everything over to make sure the fire is out," he said. "They looked in the windshield."
But Montes, who is married to Bailey's daughter, Renee, said he could see Bailey's skull and other bones inside the car. The disturbing mental images have caused sleeping problems, and Montes said both he and his wife are on medication.
"It's killing us," he said.
Autopsy results were not available Tuesday, but Montes questioned whether Bailey might have suffered a heart attack and dropped a cigarette inside the car. The vehicle was parked near the house and the fire melted the siding.
Bailey, who operated Bailey's Concessions and owned several concessions trailers, was the only one home when the fire started. Montes was waiting for Bailey to arrive at a Gun Lake restaurant that Bailey was trying to sell. They planned to show the restaurant to a prospective buyer that morning.
"He had those people coming, and I know he wouldn't have missed it," said Montes, who eventually went looking for Bailey.
He believes fire officials should apologize.
"They haven't even said they made a mistake," Montes said. "They are making excuses."
Should they apologize? What do you think?
Former Redondo Beach fire chief dies - The Daily Breeze
Former Redondo Beach fire chief dies - The Daily Breeze
Richard Bridges, who served as fire chief in Redondo Beach for five years, died Monday. He was 64.
Bridges, a Redondo Beach resident who held the city's top fire job from 1989 to 1994, most recently served as associate dean of public safety and fire technology at Santa Ana College, running the school's fire academy.
"He was an inspiration to a lot of people here at the college and we are all better people for having known him," academy commander Ken Soltis said.
Bridges' death resulted from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, authorities said.
His wife, Alice, said he had been diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor 14 months ago.
Alice Bridges summoned fire officials Monday when she found her husband.
Bridges was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.
"He gave it the good fight and I think had gotten to the point where he just had enough," Alice Bridges said.
"What has sustained him over the last 14 months is his undying faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He just really had a strong belief in God and that people need to know the truth about the Bible. He led his life that way."
Bridges was fire chief in National City from 1979 to 1983 and in Daly City before he was hired to run the Redondo Beach department in 1989.
Bridges took the fire chief job in Santa Monica in 1994.
Bridges moved on to Santa Ana College in 1997, running the program that trained students to become firefighters and other positions in the fire services.
Bridges underwent surgery and chemotherapy and recently had some surgeries because of complications from medication, his wife said.
He worked through the beginning of the summer, Soltis said.
"Excellent, excellent man," Soltis said. "You just can't say enough about someone like him. He was definitely a quality individual."
Bridges was married to his wife for 28 years. They had two daughters and four granddaughters.
"He was a wonderful man and had so many people loving him and praying for him all around the world," his wife said.
"I think that's why we have sustained the journey for so long. He was quite a man."
RIP Jefe. It was an honor to work for you, and with you. You will be sorely missed, but your lessons will always be remembered. Thank you. SF
A celebration memorial service for Richard Bridges in the main sanctuary will be held on this Friday, September 5th at 3:00 p.m.to 4:00 p.m. at Rolling Hills Covenant Church.Please note Alice has requested that dress be business casual.
2222 Palos Verdes Dr. N., Rolling Hills Estates, CA 90274
Church Telephone Number: 310-519-9406. (mapquest)
There is a website that you can go to: www.LAfuneral.com.
There is a ice cream sundae buffet to follow which is downstairs in Carlson Hall.
Please continue to spread the word.
Great White offer $1 million to gig fire victims
100 people died at the rockers' show
Band members from rock band have agreed to pay $1 million in total to survivors and victims families who were in a fire sparked by their pyrotechnics during one of their shows.
The gig took place at The Station nightclub in February 2003 in West Warwick, Rhode Island, USA, after sparks from pyrotechnics used at the opening of the show ignited foam that was used for soundproofing around the stage.
Approximately 100 people died, including guitarist Ty Longley, and 200 people were injured in the tragedy which, according to Associated Press, was the fourth deadliest fire in American history.
The once Grammy Award-nominated did not admit any wrongdoing as part of the settlement payment.
Their offer makes a total of about $175 million offered by dozens of defendants to settle lawsuits after the blaze.
After the fire survivors and victims' families sued several dozen defendants such as foam companies, a rock radio station that ran adverts for the gig, the club's owners and the local fire marshal.
The band's tour manager, Daniel Biechele, who shot off the streams of pyrotechnics that started the blaze at the start of the show, pleaded guilty to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter in 2006 and was recently paroled having served half of his four-year sentence.
Band members from rock band have agreed to pay $1 million in total to survivors and victims families who were in a fire sparked by their pyrotechnics during one of their shows.
The gig took place at The Station nightclub in February 2003 in West Warwick, Rhode Island, USA, after sparks from pyrotechnics used at the opening of the show ignited foam that was used for soundproofing around the stage.
Approximately 100 people died, including guitarist Ty Longley, and 200 people were injured in the tragedy which, according to Associated Press, was the fourth deadliest fire in American history.
The once Grammy Award-nominated did not admit any wrongdoing as part of the settlement payment.
Their offer makes a total of about $175 million offered by dozens of defendants to settle lawsuits after the blaze.
After the fire survivors and victims' families sued several dozen defendants such as foam companies, a rock radio station that ran adverts for the gig, the club's owners and the local fire marshal.
The band's tour manager, Daniel Biechele, who shot off the streams of pyrotechnics that started the blaze at the start of the show, pleaded guilty to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter in 2006 and was recently paroled having served half of his four-year sentence.
Thursday, August 7
9 firefighters missing, feared dead in fire helicopter crash - Los Angeles Times
9 missing, feared dead in fire helicopter crash - Los Angeles Times
A helicopter carrying a firefighting crew back to base for the night crashed in the remote reaches of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest on Tuesday evening, and nine of those on board are missing and feared dead, authorities said today.
The four others on board were critically burned, according to Ian Gregor, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration. Authorities have not yet identified all of the passengers.
The Sikorksy helicopter crashed about 7:45 p.m. Tuesday while taking off from a remote site about 35 miles northwest of Redding, in Northern California, officials said.
The chopper was shuttling a hand-crew back to its base in Junction City for the night, said Jennifer Rabuk, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Forest Service. She said the crash site -- Helispot 44 -- was a "rough opening cut by chain saws" in steep rugged terrain with a tree canopy and underbrush.
The FAA and National Transportation Safety Board are sending investigators to the scene to determine why the helicopter failed to lift off.
Ten of the victims are affiliated with Merlin, Ore.-based Grayback Forestry, one of the largest and longest-established private firefighting contractors.
"There was an incident that happened, and some of ours were involved," said Audra Moyer, a company spokeswoman.
The company identified three of the survivors, all from Medford, Ore.: Michael Brown, 20; Jonathan Frohreich, 18; and Rick Schroeder, 42. Grayback was still notifying the relatives of the missing individuals and planned to release their names shortly.
The crew was among 1,200 firefighters, assisted by nine helicopters, who were battling the Iron and Alps complex fires in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest that have burned 86,000 acres. Another firefighter assigned to the fires died late last month when he was hit by a falling tree.
The lightning fire started June 21 and is 87% contained.
The pilot and two others were taken to UC Davis Regional Burn Center in Sacramento, where two of them were listed in critical condition and the third was listed in serious condition in the Intensive Care Unit, according to Carole Gan, a hospital spokeswoman.
"All of them have burns," Gan said, declining to provide additional information on their injuries or identities.
A fourth injured person was taken to Mercy Medical Center in Redding and is in serious condition, a hospital spokesperson said.
Deborah Miley, executive director of the National Wildfire Suppression Assn., an Oregon-based group that represents private firefighting companies, said the tight-knit community of contract firefighters was staggered by Wednesday's crash. The possible fatalities appear to be the worst loss among private firefighting contractors in five years.
"In the private sector community, our biggest hazard is transportation," Miley said.
James Hall, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said he co-chaired a safety review committee in 2002 commissioned by the forest service to examine issues of aviation safety and performance during forest fires.
The 60-page report concluded, among other things, that the safety record of aerial firefighting was "unacceptable."
"Generally speaking, the fatality rate is one of the highest in aviation, period," Hall said. "It's something that is extremely dangerous to work in."
The Sikorsky S-61 was owned by Carson Helicopters of Grants Pass, Ore., which describes itself as one of the largest firefighting helicopter contractors with the U.S. Forest Service and Department of the Interior. According to a Times review of forest service records, Carson is one of several aviation companies regularly used by the agency to fight wildfires in California. From 2000 to 2007, the company was paid more than $10 million by the forest service for its work in the state.
Bob Madden, Carson's director of corporate affairs, said the S-61 aircraft was inspected twice a day as part of its agreement with the forest service and was in good shape.
Madden said the company had two pilots aboard the helicopter. One was transported to the burn center at UC Davis and the other is unaccounted for. He said authorities believe seven of the firefighters aboard worked for Grayback and the rest "could have been from the U.S. Forest Service."
The aircraft and crew were assigned to the Iron Complex fire, Madden said. The helicopter is capable of dropping water and fire retardant, but the tanks were empty at the time of the crash.
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