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You are here: Home / Climate Change / This Is Not Normal

This Is Not Normal

by TaMara|  December 30, 202110:05 pm| 59 Comments

This post is in: Climate Change, Open Threads

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More scene from the #MarshallFire by @hrichardson and @HyoungChang

See more photos from the Boulder County fires here: https://t.co/REwSbpw5Q1 pic.twitter.com/VKz3JsJqyk

— The Denver Post (@denverpost) December 31, 2021

We are fine where we are. The small fire that was just west of here tamped down quickly and did not spiral out of control as the fire southeast of us.

And yes, it’s a bit weird to pop over here and see a thread dedicated to my safety. ? Nice to see the emergency phone tree worked.  LOL.

This was Costco earlier:

Entire mall being evacuated Costco #marshallfire pic.twitter.com/rlVMsj5RV5

— nataliewarady (@N4ttybyn4ture) December 30, 2021

This Is Not Normal 3

I spent the afternoon checking on friends and clients in the area, so far they are fine.  We may need to hold a gofund me for AngryBlackLady:

I JUST REALIZED LITERALLY EVERYTHING I OWN IS (WAS?) IN A STORAGE FACILITY IN LOUISVILLE.

fuuuuuuck

— Just Regular Imani Gandy (@AngryBlackLady) December 31, 2021

None of this is normal. Cities burning in December on the Front Range. It looks like 700+ homes were gone in a matter of hours and more are still burning. The wind gusts hit 100 mph this morning. Downed power lines seemed to have been the ignition point.

The climate crisis needs to be on the top of our list, no doubt about it. And yes, I know Covid and saving Democracy – we are just going to have to chew gum, tap dance, and spin plates at the same time.

This Is Not Normal 4
This was my view when I walked outside, I drove a bit away from all the trees in my neighborhood to get a clearer view, but it looked like a wall at the end of my street.

As the climate crisis intensifies, evacuations are going to be more common. I would never have thought I’d ever have to think about evacuating for a wildfire, but Louisville burning could just as well be Longmont. Also, I live a few blocks away from a ditch (really a small river, but it’s controlled, so flooding would be unlikely if the planet wasn’t FRICKING in crisis). And tornadoes seem to be creeping further and further west of the Eastern Colorado plains – two within city limits since I moved here. So I’m going to rethink my view on preparing for an evacuation.

I think it’s time for many of us to re-evaluate evacuation plans. Where will you go? What will you save? Do you have a good supply of food, water, medical supplies if you have to stay and are isolated (this happened here with the 2013 floods) Here’s a good start to a list:

This Is Not Normal

 

And from Ready.Gov

This Is Not Normal 1 This Is Not Normal 2

 

(printable pdf here: ready_checklist)

All right, I’m going to go back to obsessing over the newscasts…

Open thread

 

 

 

 

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Reader Interactions

59Comments

  1. 1.

    Lapassionara

    December 30, 2021 at 10:10 pm

    I’m glad you are safe, but I weep for the planet.

  2. 2.

    TaMara (HFG)

    December 30, 2021 at 10:11 pm

    Also I should mention that CO had a plan for covid – people with covid had separate evacuation sites to go to. Smart government matters.

  3. 3.

    debbie

    December 30, 2021 at 10:14 pm

    Just saw video on the local news. Yikes! I hope you and your pets stay safe.

  4. 4.

    eclare

    December 30, 2021 at 10:15 pm

    @TaMara (HFG):   I wondered about that, good to hear.

  5. 5.

    Villago Delenda Est

    December 30, 2021 at 10:18 pm

    James Inhofe assures us all it’s just a Chinese hoax.

  6. 6.

    realbtl

    December 30, 2021 at 10:20 pm

    I was in Boulder ’67-’75 and keep shaking my head at this.

  7. 7.

    Achrachno

    December 30, 2021 at 10:23 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: I’m sure someone will suggest these fires are the result of Colorado not raking the fallen leaves.

    It’s good we don’t have too many idiots in this country.

  8. 8.

    Miss Bianca

    December 30, 2021 at 10:27 pm

    Somehow, on top of everything else – the notices about missing pets, lost homes, frantic evacuations of livestock and people – the image that is just crushing me right now is the fire marching towards those homes and trees still lit up with Christmas lights.

    I don’t know why that’s getting to me so bad, but it is.

  9. 9.

    Benw

    December 30, 2021 at 10:28 pm

    Glad you’re okay

  10. 10.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    December 30, 2021 at 10:29 pm

    Glad you’re ok

  11. 11.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 10:29 pm

    FWIW – Insane winds was what made the Oregon fires in Summer ’20 so bad.  We were pretty far away from the physical fires, but the air quality was soooo bad, it broke an air conditioner and a cooling fan on a computer.  Never mind what it does to human and animal lungs…  and again, we were way luckier than most.

    When you are in the “lucky” zone and are amazingly scared at how bad things got…  yup, definitely not normal.

  12. 12.

    Starfish

    December 30, 2021 at 10:38 pm

    @LeftCoastYankee: I was trying to convince my Oregon people to leave, and they were saying that air quality in the car to evacuate would be much worse than the awful air quality in the house. Our air quality in Colorado was not even a tenth of what they were experiencing that summer, and it was triggering my asthma.

  13. 13.

    Nick D

    December 30, 2021 at 10:39 pm

    TaMara, I just moved back to Boulder and am just a few houses from the yellow pre-evac area. Have Baseline Lake between us and the fire. Luckily it looks like the wind spared our neighborhood.

    Internet is still down at home, both cell and Wi-Fi. Need to go down the street for a signal.

    Also see Imani Gandi’s tweet. Lost all my stuff in storage in Louisville during the floods in 2013 I think.

    This is crazy. Are there a lot of juicers in the area? I’d love to meet sometime. I usually lurk here and rarely comment.

  14. 14.

    Ken

    December 30, 2021 at 10:40 pm

    I wish I could agree with everyone, but I’m worried this is now normal.

  15. 15.

    HumboldtBlue

    December 30, 2021 at 10:43 pm

    Sheesh, all the best, this is fucking terrible.

    Damn, what terrible conditions.

    @Ken:

    You’re not the only one.

  16. 16.

    Leslie

    December 30, 2021 at 10:44 pm

    @LeftCoastYankee: The wildfire that destroyed my hometown in 2018 (Paradise, in northern California) was also driven by high winds. It was moving at a speed of 2-3 football fields per second.

  17. 17.

    Jay

    December 30, 2021 at 10:47 pm

    @Ken:

    This is the new normal.

  18. 18.

    mrmoshpotato

    December 30, 2021 at 10:49 pm

    And yes, it’s a bit weird to pop over here and see a thread dedicated to my safety. ?

    ❤️❤️❤️ Glad you all are safe.

  19. 19.

    HumboldtBlue

    December 30, 2021 at 10:50 pm

    This is terrible.

  20. 20.

    the pollyanna from hell

    December 30, 2021 at 10:51 pm

    I’ve been warning my Denver friends and neighbors that we have too much brush and trees too close to the house. Wish I were wrong.

  21. 21.

    persistentillusion

    December 30, 2021 at 10:58 pm

    I’ve lived in southern Colorado since ’93 and so I’ve been through Hayman, Waldo, Black Forest (although that didn’t affect me as closely) and seen the many recent grass fires down here.  Climate change is here and we are going to have to try to adapt to it, if we can’t reduce it.  Winds howling down here tonight, so if anything ignites….

  22. 22.

    marcopolo

    December 30, 2021 at 11:00 pm

    Another happy you are safe.  One of the more distressing things I’ve read this week is the person who said every morning we wake up, that day will be the most climate stable day of the rest of our lives.  So, take whatever steps you can to slow this down, not contribute quite so much to it’s increase, but also appreciate the shit out of the natural world each and every day going forward because this is as good as it will be in our lifetimes.

    In other news, my NYE party is now cancelled.  How about the rest of y’all?  I was expecting this to happen so not terribly upset, I just hope we make it through the next 4 weeks or so without super tremendous disruption–life for example, what if half of the firefighters/ other emergency folks were out sick & weren’t available to deal with this fire.  That’s the kind of stuff I am worried about for Jan.

    Last but not least, wishing everyone as happy a new year as they can find.  Warm wishes for everyone’s health and safety into 2022.

    Wait, here is a feel good dog video just to get smiles back on faces (though it may already have been posted somewhere here today).

    Night all.

  23. 23.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:00 pm

    @Starfish:

    The state was still pretty much in lockdown at that point… it was definitely a lame choice unless your house was in danger: stay and have trouble breathing, or beat feet to somewhere else and risk Covid (and you know, trouble breathing).

  24. 24.

    Ohio Dad

    December 30, 2021 at 11:00 pm

    @Nick D: You can organize the meet-up, I did one once, it’s easy. Just write to a front pager and ask them to announce it. But of course because Covid, you’ll have to wait until it’s warm enough to meet outside.

    ETA: Help, I’m in moderation because spellcheck changed “mom” to “dad”?

    Thanks,

    Ohio Mom

  25. 25.

    Kalakal

    December 30, 2021 at 11:07 pm

    1. Glad to hear you’re ok. The whole thing sounds terrifying. I remember flying from NY to Tampa once and by some freak there was at least one fire in every Fl county en route at that time ( most were small, but some weren’t) It looked like something out of an SF movie.

    I’ve never been close to a wildfire and never wish to be but climate change will take away that choice from all of us

  26. 26.

    Jay

    December 30, 2021 at 11:08 pm

    @LeftCoastYankee:

    for 20 years, we survived in the Interior, with the aid of an air purifier. You might not be able to go to town or do anything outdoors, and might be on evac notice at any time, but you could breathe.

  27. 27.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:10 pm

    @Leslie:   I believe it.  What’s crazy about the Oregon fires was the trigger point was in Southern Oregon where the winds pulled from the east (desert) and whatever was coming from the Pacific raced the fire up the western slopes of the Cascades into the northern part of the state in a day.

    Again, never happened before,  but then it did.

  28. 28.

    mrmoshpotato

    December 30, 2021 at 11:14 pm

    @the pollyanna from hell:

    I’ve been warning my Denver friends and neighbors that we have too much brush and trees too close to the house. Wish I were wrong. 

    Are you not allowed to clear it?

  29. 29.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:15 pm

    @Jay:

    That’s a good plan.  I’ve got a crazy old house, which despite needing a good deal of improvements was mostly OK for Western Oregon weather.   There is absolutely nothing “air tight” about this house.

    On the plus side, I have completely overcome my fear of spiders….

  30. 30.

    cckids

    December 30, 2021 at 11:16 pm

    My daughter’s best friend is from Louisville; they’ve evacuated and are pretty sure their house is gone. It’s just devastating. They got out with their dog and a few personal items. That’s it, after 30 years in their home. Hoping for a miracle for them.

  31. 31.

    Grumpy Old Railroader

    December 30, 2021 at 11:17 pm

    The fires are out in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. 17 feet of Sierra Cement (Moisture laden snow) fixed that. Now we just have power outages and downed trees blocking every surface road. My son lost power for a few days. Generator ran out of gas so there went the well water. But he had enough gas to run a chainsaw to clear his road to get out and down the hill to us.

  32. 32.

    hotshoe

    December 30, 2021 at 11:19 pm

    Please note: Go Bag is supposed to be human-portable. Daypack portable, not steamer-trunk. Nobody says that on checklists like the ones above, so I’m saying it now.

    I know we all figure we’re going to be evacuating by vehicle — and I know that is usually true — but the Go Bag which ya throw in the backseat of that vehicle might end up being what ya carry for blocks or miles when the car breaks down or when you get boated across a flooded creek or when the first evacuation center needs to be re-evacuated in the middle of the night as the wind shifts.

    The longer lists and the heavier items are for the Emergency Supplies which you keep at home or in the car for weeks when the power is out, when you’re camped in the front yard away from the earthquake-wrecked building, etc.

    Be safe out there, folks!

  33. 33.

    CaseyL

    December 30, 2021 at 11:19 pm

    @marcopolo:

    One of the more distressing things I’ve read this week is the person who said every morning we wake up, that day will be the most climate stable day of the rest of our lives.

    I don’t know whether to cry, throw up, or go throw rocks at someone. Goddamnit.

  34. 34.

    jnfr

    December 30, 2021 at 11:19 pm

    Very glad you’re okay. These fires are burning areas we go through pretty regularly, so even though we weren’t in danger this cuts pretty close to home.

  35. 35.

    NWO Joe

    December 30, 2021 at 11:22 pm

    So sorry for all who are caught in this. I used to live out by Hugo (Eastern Plains of CO) and one year we had a fire start up out of the dump. Wind blew it up about 5 miles wide and nearly 12 miles long. Nobody lived out there but it blackened everything it touched. It was awful to see.

  36. 36.

    Jay

    December 30, 2021 at 11:24 pm

    @LeftCoastYankee:

    the small ones ($80) will clear about 750 sq ft in about 30 minutes on high, then in an airtight home, we would run it on low about once every 4 hours. Those were generally days when we couldn’t see the garden fence from the house, roughly 50 feet.

    we would leave it on low, overnight, so that we didn’t wake up hacking in the am.

  37. 37.

    Starfish

    December 30, 2021 at 11:25 pm

    @LeftCoastYankee: I have a small device that measures PM 2.5. In my house in Colorado, we were getting up to 20 which is a lot for inside the house. Usually, it is 1 or 0. My friend in Oregon was measuring around 400 after she had worked to seal off some doors in the house. She said that evacuating would put them in contact with things that were around 600 for an hour or more.

    I was struggling with the amount of particulates that we had, so I was feeling horrible for my friend.

  38. 38.

    Starboard Tack

    December 30, 2021 at 11:31 pm

    @the pollyanna from hell:

    Our housing and landscaping aren’t designed for the weather and climate disasters we’re going to have to deal with, wildfires, tornados and hurricanes, could be earthquakes, too.

  39. 39.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:33 pm

    @Jay:

    I should get one (or more).  Also, switch to central air from jumbo window units (closed windows is easier than sealed windows).  Also, a central unit will have better filtering (and help with those 115 degree days… but that was Summer ’21).

  40. 40.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:38 pm

    @Starfish:

    Oh god, IIRC the federal website that reported that was basically saying “we’ve never measured air quality this crappy in a city in the entire world”.  It had to be way worse outside of town.

    The after effect of the insane winds was the air not moving at all for like a week.

    And again, we survived so… I’m hoping the same for the folks in CO tonight.

  41. 41.

    LeftCoastYankee

    December 30, 2021 at 11:41 pm

    2022:  This year we become experts on the variety of risks from grass fires, brush fires and forest fires….

  42. 42.

    jnfr

    December 30, 2021 at 11:48 pm

    @the pollyanna from hell: ​
    Honestly I think they need to be much more cautious about building large numbers of wood houses so closely spaced up in the high wind zone. Fire is endemic there, and it’s not going to get better as the world warms.

    The news said our area has gotten about 1.5 inches of rain since June, total.

  43. 43.

    Suzanne

    December 30, 2021 at 11:53 pm

    @jnfr: There is no way to build housing out of steel affordably at the scale we need.

  44. 44.

    jnfr

    December 30, 2021 at 11:58 pm

    That would get hard to cool in our Colorado sun too :)

  45. 45.

    Mercy

    December 31, 2021 at 12:11 am

    My parents, and my aunt, live in Louisville. All three (and the cats!) got out to Boulder this afternoon. Mom reported flames licking through the empty lot two doors down from their place as they scudded out the door.

    No idea whether my parents’ house made it, but it’s on the Davidson Mesa open space and I dread the worst while trying to hope for the best.

    I wish 2021 would just END already.

  46. 46.

    bad santa

    December 31, 2021 at 12:25 am

    Stupid fucking white man.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvrwhZUHaKg

  47. 47.

    TaMara (HFG)

    December 31, 2021 at 12:25 am

    @Mercy: Oh, that’s horrible. I am so sorry. I was literally just watching video of that area from early this evening:

    https://www.9news.com/video/news/local/wildfire/homes-appear-to-burn-in-louisville-as-grass-fires-continue-across-boulder-county/73-7e6afca2-377c-481c-b989-995d0d555a9d?jwsource=cl

  48. 48.

    toine

    December 31, 2021 at 12:29 am

    If you can cross the border, all are welcome to come hunker down for as long as necessary at my place, just south of Montreal. Bonus: real bagels….

  49. 49.

    RaflW

    December 31, 2021 at 12:29 am

    @jnfr: This Old House did a 4 part series on the Paradise fire & rebuilding. A lot of interesting stuff about fire-resistant building.

    Roofs can be less susceptible to embers. Soffit vents can have heat-change properties that shut the vent to keep flame from licking up into the rafters. Stucco or other non-wood siding of course is better. Careful selections of plantings and locations and removing ladder fuels.

    But the sad reality is, those materials are geared towards giving people time to evacuate, not full envelop protection.

  50. 50.

    Mary G

    December 31, 2021 at 12:33 am

    I’ve been reorganizing my go bag all day. I worry so much about the cats – semi-feral gets better, but they both freak out at the slightest event and run to hide. I got rid of Shiloh’s fort a couple of weeks ago – an old arm chair and ottoman too big to extract him from under. Anyone have strategies to suggest? The carriers are always out and stocked with soft bedding and treats, but they wait until I am far away to go in.

  51. 51.

    Leslie

    December 31, 2021 at 12:52 am

    @LeftCoastYankee: Too many firsts.

  52. 52.

    sab

    December 31, 2021 at 12:54 am

    Pet carriers. We have six cats and two pet carriers. The big carrier could hold two in a pinch.So half the cats would be out of luck if we had to evacuate.

  53. 53.

    CaseyL

    December 31, 2021 at 1:00 am

    Would it be best, if you can’t round up the critters, to leave a window or door open on your way out so they can escape?

    I honestly don’t know if it’s better for them to run, panicking, into the wilderness, and it would take a miracle to find them again… but anything’s got to be better than being trapped in a burning house.

  54. 54.

    West of the Rockies

    December 31, 2021 at 1:05 am

    @Leslie:

    My town, too.  PHS class of ’80.

  55. 55.

    Jay

    December 31, 2021 at 1:06 am

    @Mary G:

    training. At random times, grab them by the scruff and lock them in. Eventually they go passive.

  56. 56.

    ColoradoGuy

    December 31, 2021 at 1:07 am

    Thanks for the pix of the Denver Go Bag … looks simple and useful. Backups for our computers are compact SSD’s, so that’s another item.

    Certainly one of the more unsettling events since moving to Erie in 2005. It’s hard to describe to Northwesterners (where we used to live) just how intense the 75 to 100mph winds are here. Hurricane-strength microbursts that happen without warning (and can flip jetliners upside-down), hailstorms, and the kind of winds we had today, coming out of one of the mountain canyons. It would have been an uneventful day except for the spark provided by a downed power line, and no precipitation since June.

  57. 57.

    the pollyanna from hell

    December 31, 2021 at 2:05 am

    @mrmoshpotato: Am not the owner.

  58. 58.

    John fremont

    December 31, 2021 at 2:45 am

    Lurker. This is another good program for emergency preparedness. As Rebecca Solnit wrote in her book, A Paradise Built In Hell, most people aspire to help each other during natural disasters. This program builds upon that

    https://www.ready.gov/cert

  59. 59.

    SFAW

    December 31, 2021 at 7:09 am

    Glad you’re safe. Keeping the other local BJers in my thoughts.

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