Houses Gone Along Coyote Road, Mountain Drive

Any specifics on Westmont Road & Circle Drive?

Is no one unhappy with the city of Santa Barbara for sending fire supression to Santa Maria? How many homes and wildlands could have been saved in the Gap Fire and now the Tea Fire if planes could be reloading with retardant at the Santa Barbara Airport instead of flying to Santa Maria and then flying back? There the facility sits - unused. It is criminal - and all in the name of the almighty dollar!

lisaw, good troll. Questions can come later, now is the time for assistance.

Find something constructive to do besides complaining.

Stinky: Perhaps the airport could open the facilties out of good will? Does this need to be spelled out for you?

Lisaw, yes - I didn't get that from your post. Good idea.

Stinky: Now is the time for the observation. Once over, out of sight, out of mind.

Your premise, lisaw, is so speculative as to be worthless. No, I'm not angry at the change in homebase for the planes.

Lay folk need to realize planes are just one tool in fire suppression -- glamorous and visible, but they cannot manufacture miracles. And from what I've heard and observed on this fire, there were plenty of planes, planning and people devoted toward handling at this tremendous fire.

lisaw, you're talking about an extra several minutes of flight time to Santa Barbara from Santa Maria versus from SBA. 30 miles in the air is not much for a plane flying at several hundred mile per hour. I'd rather they take a little longer each trip and save money to buy, uh, fire retardant than spend that money on airport rent. Money for fighting fires is not an infinite resource.

And no homes could be saved by planes last night in the first place. They can't fly at night. It's too dangerous to have planes flying along the terrain when they can't see the terrain!

I wish people would give professionals credit for the dangerous, heroic work they're doing instead of complaining more is not being done. You can only do more if you either have more funding or compromise the safety of fire professionals.

lisaw, now you say let the aircraft fly for free. Not gonna work. Someone has to pay for runway upkeep and general usage of airport facilities. There is no free lunch. Maybe SBA was trying to gouge the forest service with what they were charging. I really don't know. But maybe they were charging what it took to cover costs associated with running fire fighting flights out of SBA, and it's just that much cheaper for upkeep in Santa Maria.

I love people like LisaW who are uneducated about how finances are divided and how decisions are made about county resouces. She most likely does not know that, not only is it cheaper to arial bomb from Santa Maria, and Santa Maria is now the largest city in SB County, but she has no clue that the back mountains are usually where most of the bombing is done. It is unusual for the fires this year to be on the coastal side. She is also the type that would bitch about paying more taxes to keep the service local to our Sea Side Paradise.

I read and heard on some other news sites that they even used some new, high-advanced helis that sucked water out of the Pacific Ocean and just dropped it onto the 'Tea fire' during the night, using night-goggles. Oh boy, almost like they do in LA!

No helis were flying during the Gap fire at night; and yes, they did have to fly all the way to far-away Santa Maria during Gap and Zaca (not as far as the DC-10 has to fly, though).

GR

Are we even sure that the flights moved because of money? I can find no references to this, does anyone have any? Perhaps they moved to reduce the possibility of accidents caused by landing in the smoke...

As recommended by INDY:
http://cbs2.com/
is live streaming images from a news heli most of today.

Not many flames to be seen, looks like its almost out. But then, again, Gap looked similar after a couple of days (and hadn't burned any houses or torched so many acres by that time).

Waiting for those 'sundowners' to come or not to come...

GR

Looking at the cbs2 news heli images most of the day, seeing mountains 'licked' clean by 'fire-tongues', those mountains do look the same as here in Goleta. EVEN money can't save your home!

GR

Wow - what a bunch of... Did you actually see what was going on? Fixed wing aircraft would not have saved a single home if based in SB as opposed to SM - too dark once the fire started! It was obvious to most aware folks that MANY houses were going to be lost in the first few hours last night. The firefighters' response to the call that went out almost immediately was phenomenal!

PEOPLE were lucky to have gotten out of the way (a few didn't!). We were lucky to have only lost those houses that we did. AND we were (are) lucky that winds let up overnight and didn't pick back up (thus far) on Friday.

I really feel sorry for eveyone who lost something in this fire. At least it wasn't lives, because it very well could have been given the RAPID development of the fire.

The Forest Service made the decision to move to Santa Maria on their own. They were getting the space at Santa Barbara for below market rent. The City of Santa Barbara did not ask or encourage them to leave. Santa Maria Airport had more parking area available for their planes and a longer runway. Since they serve north county as well, the Forest Service decided to make the move.

For those of you that work outdoors all day long and need good comfortable protection, try picking up a DUS-T at the local lumberyards like Channel City Lumber, Newtons Building Supply or Goleta Building Material. For those of you that have been removed from your homes and are having a hard time, please contact Steve at 805-968-4212 and we will hook you up with a DUS-T to help you through these difficult times. If you are an employer with a crew of guys that work outdoors, be sure to get them something to help from breathing the ash, facial hair like beards and goatees limit the performance of conventional masks and air-born debris will be a factor for those people who make a living outside for several weeks.
Best of Luck to everyone!
SB
ICHANGE inc.
Goleta CA.

Watching cbs2 live heli stream, it looks like the wind has started to lightly move towards the ocean.

Does anyone know if 1050 Mountain Road burned down as well. It was built by Kit Tremaine, a former friend of mine. It was a beautiful place - built with home-made adobe bricks. I sure hope it survived. Not sure who the current owner is.

Wrong address in my last post. Should be 1050 Coyote Road, not Mountain Road. Sorry.

I did see on one news page that 1050 Coyote had burned down. Of course, not sure how accurate any information is at this point...

My understanding is that one of the few houses that did not burn on Coyote Rd is 1025... it is still standing.

Hey Ray, is the fire pretty much 'out' by now? Wondering why you haven't been as 'active' reporting on this one than you have been on the other two - may it be a statement for 'us the people' (compared to 'them, the billionaires'? - ooops - I shouldn't have said that, but, then, again - I am the 'Gingerbread Man' (catch me, if you can)).

GR

LA is burning again. Kind of 'funny' how yesterday the cbs2 news heli pilot (yes, the actual pilot talking, providing the most interesting news I've heard all day long!) said that he'd expect a fire to start in LA due to the hot and dry weather conditions - but, of course, it is not 'funny'!

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-...

I'm so sorry for anyone who lost a house in the fire. I understand what you're going through. We've been through it. Our non-profit helps people through the process. Please feel free to contact us

www.carehelp.org

GoletaResident,

Ray Ford has done an amazing job covering not only this fire, but virtually any other disaster in recent history in town. Honestly, I don't know what we'd all do without his reporting.

That being said, it is a huge insult to Mr. Ford to insinuate that he might possibly subscribe to your own ridiculous and shallow view that only billionaires live in Montecito.

I'm sure someone of the professionalism and intelligence of Mr. Ford would never agree that polarizing the coverage of, or response to, a disaster would ever be appropriate.