Tuesday 1 September 2009

Wrath of summer sun in California












The catastrophic fires in California are another reason why I continue to feel devastated for such a long time. After the fires in Athens, now California is burning. The historic Yosemite park is threatened, among other vital spots including Mont Wilson.
Californian residents are living days of hell. Marvellous californian nature and wild life is threatened seriously again.
The greek government will no doubt now say that fires in the summer are an unavoidable part of the scenery. Perhaps. Once they start it is difficult to put them out. In the California fires two brave firemen lost their lives. Fire Captain Tedmund "Ted" Hall was 47 years of age and was a member of the Los Angeles County Fire Department for 26 years and lived in San Bernardino County, California. Firefighter Specialist Arnaldo "Arnie" Quinones was 35 years of Age, and was a member of the Los Angeles County Fire department for 8 years and lived in Palmdale, California.

Besides these two firemen there were three civilians that died but that's only because they did not follow guidelines...yes, they existed. Guidelines I mean.
"There were people that did not listen and there were three people that got burned and got critically injured because they did not listen," said Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's governor.

To the dismay of the greek government, most likely the californian fires did not start from arson. Like the Athens fires.

The californian government and the entire administration knows how to deal with this stuff and is actually doing something more than praying or just expecting firefighters to do the job on their own without any help. Mr Schwarzenegger has declared a state of emergency in some areas as firemen warned they wouldn't be able to put out the fire for at least a week.

Citizens are better coordinated and informed. Human and animal shelters have been organized. Citizens are asked exactly how they can help.
For example check out this blog:
http://calfire.blogspot.com/
In it you will find links to other incident sites that keep you uptodate with what is going on and directions of what to do if you found an injured human or animal.

Oh, and get this: Most of these initiatives are state organized. State government or the various administrative bodies and departments. For instance, in California a Forrest department actually exists!!!! http://www.fire.ca.gov/
Actually it is called california department of forrestry and fire protection. It is not that in california fires don't get wild. It is that the land is not built afterwards, it is that there is a special force that is protecting the forrests, it is that fire departments, despite the accidents, are more numerous and better equipped within the borders of california...It is that californians feel safer with their government, their forrestry, their country.

I still feel devastated. About the Athens fires, the Californian fires, and most of all the Greek political parties and of course government. Which comes down to the people in Greece that vote for those morons.

1 comment:

George Georgitsis said...

Loved the parallels drawn between California and Athens fires.

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