Cal-Fire Firefighter Training

                              

Early on Thursday Cal-Fire was out in force.  Above is just a few of the firefighters gathering for the training.  They all got instructions and then headed out into the meadow.  They actually walked the perimeter of the meadow, where the trees are.

                                  

On Wednesday they burned areas to create fire breaks.  That way when they do the training it is more controlled.

That took a while and then they had to get repositioned because the wind changed.  They then started to do the burn.  Evidently there are different types of grasses out there.  Not all would be burned.  There is an invasive Mustard plant that retains moisture so if it isn’t dry enough to kill the seeds they will do it at another time.

There’s always someone watching and directing.

 

One of the firefighters gave me a mini lesson on what and how it all happens.  He also shared with me about a lucky break they had.  It seems that when they were preparing, one of the engines went over an area where a Mallard Duck was flushed out of the grass and then went right back.  They had luckily missed the nest and then partitioned off a 100 foot buffer around the nest linking it with an unburned area to protect it. 

                              

Of course there was one of the Rangers on hand to observe.

                               

I tried to get some shots with flames.  It was hard to get because they kept the flames low and controlled. The picture on the left, below shows the fire, but it is actually behind him.  There was a lot of smoke.

The two pictures blow are taken from one of the campsites up the hill, before and after the burn.

These are later when they were done, although there was someone to watch out for the hot spots.

 

These fellows were going over the entire exercise.

The Crows were having a field day eating all the barbequed grasshoppers.

                              

I hope that someone out there in blog land found this interesting.

Thanks for visiting

I had to sit in the cart and smell the stinky smoke

Susan and Angel