Eaton Fire: A rebuilding journey

A fire that broke out near Vandenburg Air Force Base has burned through some 300 acres and was 50 percent contained this evening, according to the Associated Press. The Lompoc-area base, about 60 miles northwest of Santa Barbara, employs up to 10,000 people on any given day. 25 buildings with non-essential personnel were sent home early. The blaze began around noon when a transformer blew near the base's main gate along the Pacific Coast...

Dry brush = a fire's fuel | Photo by Caveman 92223 via Flickr Yesterday it was a fire weather watch, but today the National Weather Service upgraded those warnings into Red Flags. Temperatures will not be as warm as last week, but high winds and low humidity are concerning officials over potential for wildfires. "The Santa Ynez range and downwind coastal sections of Santa Barbara County will be the first to experience the dry...

Photo by Caveman 92223 via Flickr The temperatures have been great so far this week, but they might be slightly spoiled as Santa Ana winds pick up beginning Wednesday night and last through Friday. "Humidities will be dropping through the day Wednesday and by Wednesday night into Thursday many areas of Southwest California will be experiencing a combination of gusty Santa Ana winds and humidities at or below 15 percent," the National Weather Service...

Fully contained yesterday, the Guiberson Fire burned through some 17,500 acres, injuring 10, destroying one outbuilding and costing nearly $10 million. On Sunday, the Advanced Land Imager on NASA’s Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite caught this false-color image of the fire area by using "shortwave infrared light to increase the contrast between burned and unburned land."

The National Weather Service last night extended the Red Flag warning, due to expire last night, to Saturday evening for mountain areas of Los Angeles and Ventura counties. However, fire-weather related warnings for Valleys in both counties did expire last night. "While the offshore winds have weakened, the triple digit heat and single digit humidities continues across the valleys and mountains of Los Angeles and Ventura counties," a National Weather Service advisory said. Temperatures...

The Guiberson Fire, center, as seen from space Just one hour and one half into the Guiberson Fire on Tuesday, NASA's Terra satellite captured smoke billowing over the Santa Susana Mountains and into the Oxnard Plain toward the Pacific Ocean. Further west is Santa Cruz Island, the biggest Channel Island at the size of 96 square miles. The smoke cloud appears to be the same size. The fire has so-far consumed 16,400 acres and...

Camp crew firefighters climb a ridge during the Station Fire (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill) The Station Fire began four weeks ago today on August 26th. Back then, the already-burning Morris Fire was dominating concern from authorities, but then the Station Fire took a turn for the worst, eventually burning through 250 square miles of the Angeles National Forest and becoming the biggest fire in Los Angeles County history (and in the top ten for...

1,000 more acres have been burned since earlier reports this morning as the Guiberson Fire rages on in Ventura County. As the 600 firefighters on scene upped containment to 20 percent, a number of schools were closed as a precaution as the fire neared Moorpark. Moorpark College, Campus Canyon School and Walnut Canyon School are all closed today, according to the Ventura County Star....

Earlier today, Norco officials were optimistic that the La Sierra Fire would be out by now. However, the fire is currently 50 percent contained and has burned through some 175 acres, according to numerous media reports. It began in Norco near the city of Riverside. "What we didn't see before were the driving winds," explained Bill Peters of CalFire to ABC7. "The driving winds are really what create the catoshpric fires in Southern California."...

The Guiberson Fire as seen from Fillmore | Photo by MorroBayChuck via Flickr The Guiberson Fire began around 10:30 a.m. this morning in Fillmore, north of Moorpark over the Santa Susana Mountains. Fueled by red flag weather and Santa Ana winds, the blaze quickly consumed at least 6,000 acres, prompting a number of evacuations and around 400 firefighters to respond, two of which that have suffered injuries. So far, it is zero percent contained....