Over half a million people are being evacuated from areas near several huge wildfires burning in southern California right now. It is amazing to look at the images of this area from NASA's Aqua satellite.
Double click to zoom in
This image comes from NASA's MODIS Rapid Response website. This site is always a good place to check for a bird's eye view on large scale natural disasters.
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This twitter account is a great way to follow what is happening with the fires around San Diego. http://twitter.com/sandiegofire
I was reading some congressional comments concerning these fires, started by arson or powerlines. Harry Reid says it is a case of global warming. This makes Global warming as believable as Y2K. government scare tactics. All we need to be is good stewards of what we have. Arrogant are those that think we can have that big of an effect on the whole world. Looking at this valley where the fires are, will be clear of smoke when the fires are smothered. It is that simple. There is no long term effect.
Hey Terry, I agree with you on several points. I was dismayed to see the cable news networks immediately jumping to seemingly scientific conclusions about the cause of these fires. It's just irresponsible to attribute everything to global warming. Now, I do beleive that massive changes in our climate do have an affect on the distribution and scale of these sorts of natural disasters. But these immediate cause and effect hypothesis from the mouth of people like Anderson Cooper do a disservice to the complexity of climate science.
There are more interesting local questions about these fires that have little to do with global climate. What has been the long term fire management strategy in this area? Forrest fires are part of a natural process that can be exacerbated by constant suppression. Did that have a role to play in the scale of this fire?
Oh and here is a link to the AQUA satellite image of the fires from yesterday. You can see how the winds have calmed down a bit compared to the previous image.
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