6 ms·

Show HN: LA Wildfire Satellite Analysis

117 points by xingyzt 2y ago

giancarlostoro 2y ago
I really don't understand why something that is presumed preventable with little investment is allowed to continue happening. What's worse is the water shortage is what I don't understand. It's a state literally bordering the ocean. That graph is impressive, and really shocking how much land these fires are just taking.
- block_dagger 2y ago
  Wildfires in California date back millions of years and are a natural part of the region's ecology. The difference in recent centuries has been dense human habitation. I think your statement about presumed prevention is inaccurate or misleading.
  - 7e 2y ago
    Another difference is a steady increase in the world temperature due to climate change.
    - the_third_wave 2y ago
      That is nonsense, the climate has been changing all the time without the place burning down to the roots when it happened to be a bit warmer or not burning at all when it was cooler. These fires have nothing to do with 'climate change', they are caused by the lack of controlled burning which leads to an accumulation of combustible material on the forest floor. Once a fire starts - and fires start all the time, both from natural (lightning etc.) as well as man-made (PG&E cables, careless campers, smokers, fireworks, arson, etc.) causes - they quickly bloom into massive conflagrations due to the presence of all that combustible material. Increased habitation makes these massive fires more costly since fire consumes a McMansion just as readily as it does a Pacific pine.
      - polotics 2y ago
        You wrote "the climate has been changing all the time" It must have taken you so much effort and thinking to come up with such an illuminating, novel, and profound assertion. Here is something of that ilk: The statement "the climate has been changing all the time" is often used to downplay the significance of current climate change. While it's true that Earth's climate has undergone natural changes throughout its history, the current warming trend is different for several reasons: Rate of Change: The current rate of warming is unprecedented in the past several thousand years. Natural climate fluctuations typically occur over much longer timescales, allowing ecosystems and species to adapt gradually. The rapid pace of current change is making it difficult for many species to keep up, leading to disruptions in ecosystems and biodiversity loss. Cause of Change: While past climate change events were triggered by natural factors like volcanic eruptions or solar variations, the current warming trend is primarily driven by human activities, particularly the burning of fossil fuels. This has led to a significant increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, trapping heat and warming the planet. Magnitude of Change: The projected magnitude of future warming, if left unchecked, is likely to exceed the changes experienced during the past several million years. This could have severe consequences for human societies and natural ecosystems, including rising sea levels, more frequent and intense extreme weather events, and widespread species extinctions. Evidence: The overwhelming scientific consensus supports the conclusion that human activities are the primary cause of current climate change. This is based on a vast body of evidence from multiple independent lines of research, including temperature records, ice core data, and climate models. In summary, while the Earth's climate has naturally changed over long periods, the current warming trend is distinct in its rate, cause, magnitude, and supporting evidence. It is crucial to recognize the unique nature of human-induced climate change and take action to mitigate its impacts.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        vixen99 2y ago
        Your comment comes across as markedly authoritative. Are you a climate scientist with first hand knowledge? You appear to be repeating what we all read in countless reports almost daily from innumerable organizations and have done over the past few years. I'm pretty sure like many here I could probably offer an impromptu talk like this at the drop of a hat, covering the same points. I do wonder why we accept the reports from a number of rather distinguished climatologists and physicists who do not accept this 'scientific consensus'. Given the very significant swathe of the public who are convinced by the latter, why isn't this academic divide finally put to rest and the skeptics shown to be demonstrably wrong in their selection of data and their interpretations? It does not seem to happen. Why not? If this is an existential crisis I would have thought that such public debates at a very high level by extremely well-informed experts are well overdue. Yes, some occur but they are never definitive? "Current surveys may underestimate climate change skepticism evidence from list experiments in Germany and the USA" https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8262789/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8262789/
  - aa-jv 2y ago
    The previous inhabitants knew all about these firestorms and used controlled burning to minimize their impact. Its probably going to be wise for future governors to consider re-learning this knowledge....
    - theultdev 2y ago
      No need to look back that far. They know to do use control burns, we've been doing it. It's forest management 101. But they get sued by environmentalists when they do.
  - greentxt 2y ago
    You make it sound unidimensional but there is probably not 1 type of wildfire in California. Coastal residentially dense fires in chaperal are not the same things as massive fires burning in remote areas of national forrests in the sierras. There is no single cause or solution because they are totally different things, with different drivers and requiring different solutions.
- jazzyjackson 2y ago
  Who's presuming it's preventable? What little investment do you suggest California make? Probably slow controlled burns would be helpful in reducing potential fuel, but who's going to perform controlled burns over the entirety of all the hills surrounding LA ?
  - defrost 2y ago
    I cannot answer the "who" but here in a region with similar vegetation and fire risk we don't cool burn the entirety, we stagger mosaic burns that break up the fire risk area into patches. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKsLRNbczJY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKsLRNbczJY
    - lazide 2y ago
      When I last talked to USFS folks, one big issue is complaints and even legal action from folks about smoke when they do burn. It’s a lose/lose situation for them.
      - defrost 2y ago
        That and insurance no doubt. What's needed is the reeducation of the NIMBY crowd .. I live in a state where many local community members are motivated to egage with local volunteer bush fire services and cool burning is less of an issue. As the urbanisation and luxury housing increases the resistance to "inconveniance" seems to also climb.
        lazide 2y ago
        I doubt very much it’s a matter of lack of knowledge/education. Rather various degrees of ‘fuck you, I got mine’ and ‘it won’t happen to me because I’m special’. Which, often, is true enough they can keep doing it until they die, at which point they ‘win’. Sometimes though, either something happens and they ‘don’t have theirs’ anymore, or it becomes too clear it will happen to them - and some action occurs. Usually too late for it to be an easy or smooth change, of course.
- hedora 2y ago
  There are two issues. For thousands of years, indigenous people maintained the forest and small fires cleaned out the underbrush. The US halted maintenance, and suppressed fires, creating a backlog of fuel. The second issue is global warming. If you have any ideas on how to get the manpower necessary to perform 100+ years of backlogged forest maintenance spanning the entire west coast, or (better) how to fix global warming, I’d love to hear it. Also, desalination at the scale necessary to meet California’s demands is beyond current technology (especially if it’s done without destroying the ocean ecosystem). Note that the central valley relies on irrigation, and is the bread basket of the US.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
    You can extinguish a fire with salt water. Connect the sewage / storm water system to a few massive pumps and back flush everything. Set off a few nukes in the bay to cause a tidal wave. I’m no civil engineer / hydrologished, so there’s probably issues with my drive-by dismissal of a serious issue.
    - calgoo 2y ago
      So yes, you can put out fires with salt water but its bad for any equipment that is currently being used * and it hurts the future plant life (salting the earth is an old method of hurting your enemies * ). * https://firefighterinsider.com/can-you-put-out-a-fire-with-seawater-does-it-work/ https://firefighterinsider.com/can-you-put-out-a-fire-with-s... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salting_the_earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salting_the_earth
      - shwaj 2y ago
        I love how you respond seriously to the logistical challenges of salt water, and don’t blink at the prospect of using nukes to create a tidal wave.
      - TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
        While we’re speaking about future plant life, it isn’t necessarily looking particularly good.
- Redoubts 2y ago
  The Sierra Club sues any attempt to do preventive burns. Forest management can take 4-7 years between planning and execution for any one task. https://x.com/tahrajirari/status/1877110097790312519 https://x.com/tahrajirari/status/1877110097790312519
- pancakemouse 2y ago
  > preventable Preventable via multiple methods, you've been downvoted presumably for seeming insensitivity, but it seems a valid question. Water is plentiful, it's a rich area. This stuff can be prevented. Why wasn't it?
- gamblor956 2y ago
  1) There wasn't a water shortage. The local reservoirs were full at the start of the fire. The problem was that there was so much simultaneous demand that there was insufficient water pressure. This was compounded by the destruction of pumping stations by the fire, and by the extreme winds preventing the use of aerial support (i.e., water and fire retardant) on Tuesday, when most of the Palisades were burned. 2) Salt water is highly corrosive to equipment, and also kills vegetation. But it used as a last resort when fresh water reservoirs are empty...and was used in previous Malibu fires... 3) For an example of how important aerial support is: the Sunset Fire and the Mt Wilson flameup of the Eaton fire were controlled within an hour each through the use of aerial water drops.
dheera 2y ago
> We download the reprojected data from UW SSEC's RealEarth program I really wish GOES's official images would provide the high resolution imagery directly. We shouldn't have to go through RealEarth to get it. However I've noticed that only RealEarth has the highest resolution images.
mackid 2y ago
Thanks for sharing. Do you work with the folks at Watch Duty?
- xingyzt 2y ago
  No, just a student on winter break who got curious why CA Fire's map wasn't showing the up-to-date extent of the Eaton fire. Do they have this kind of heat data?
  - mackid 2y ago
    They integrate a number of sources. Satellite, cameras, weather, CalFire, etc. Check out their app, it’s free. They are a non-profit Startup, which is an interesting approach.
mzs 2y ago
Nice, thanks but did you know about NASA FIRMS? https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@-117.8,34.6,6.9z https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@-117.8,34...
- xingyzt 2y ago
  No, looks like they're doing a way better job! Thanks for sharing. I was only aware of the GOES sats. Seems like VIIRS is more intended to do this kind of monitoring.
  - mzs 2y ago
    I still like what you did on break. FWIW GEOS provides Fire Temperature: https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/sector_band.php?sat=G18&sector=psw&band=FireTemperature&length=24 https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/sector_band.php?sat=G1...
- pixelesque 2y ago
  Interesting that FIRMS doesn't seem to yet be showing the "Sunset" fire, or anything West of Griffith Park...
  - xingyzt 2y ago
    Maybe because FIRMS uses data from satellites in polar orbits, which only pass over the area once every few hours? With choosing near-Earth polar vs. farther geostationary orbits there's a tradeoff between space and time resolution.
- notatoad 2y ago
  FIRMS is very cool, but take it with a grain of salt - we were all looking at it obsessively while Jasper AB burned this summer, and apparently it has issues with differentiating between fire on the ground and fire in the smoke clouds, so it can make the fire boundary look bigger than it actually is.
- dbetteridge 2y ago
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
tikkun 2y ago
Another fire project idea: show, based on some kind of prediction model that gives 50th, 90th, 99th percentiles (from historical data, perhaps, or perhaps just from wind/fire speeds), how fast a given fire could reach a specific location. Whenever I've opened watch duty, that's always the question I'm asking. How long might it take to reach [here/there]?
- lazide 2y ago
  It’s a very dangerous answer to try to give someone, because of how unpredictable and dangerous a wildfire is. Sudden shifts in winds and can have the flames jump (literally) miles in minutes, after sitting calmly for hours. It isn’t theoretical either - it kills professionals too. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mann_Gulch_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mann_Gulch_fire], [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Canyon_Fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Canyon_Fire], [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dude_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dude_fire] for a few examples. Long story short - never turn your back on a wildfire, and try to stay as far away as possible.
  - tikkun 2y ago
    Right, they seem highly volatile/variable. The thinking is that showing the 99th percentile / range of possibilities would cover that, if it's based on historical data - does that seem right to you or no, and if not why not?
    - lazide 2y ago
      It would be like if someone you never met came up to you and held a revolver to your head, and told you they were going to play Russian roulette. If they told you the 99% percentile odds of the next trigger pull, would it be okay to stay if you thought you liked the odds? And if you were silly enough to believe him, who would be to blame if he was wrong? Oh, here are some more [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarnell_Hill_Fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarnell_Hill_Fire]. Oh and [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Griffith_Park_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Griffith_Park_fire]. And [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Fire_of_1937 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Fire_of_1937] There is a reason why firefighters are considered to be one of the most heroic professionals. And some more (not all related to wildfires though) [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_deadliest_firefighter_disasters_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_deadliest_firefi...]
soundblaster 2y ago
cmap="inferno", lml

117 points by xingyzt 2y ago

I really don't understand why something that is presumed preventable with little investment is allowed to continue happening. What's worse is the water shortage is what I don't understand. It's a state literally bordering the ocean. That graph is impressive, and really shocking how much land these fires are just taking.

block_dagger 2y ago
Wildfires in California date back millions of years and are a natural part of the region's ecology. The difference in recent centuries has been dense human habitation. I think your statement about presumed prevention is inaccurate or misleading.
- 7e 2y ago
  Another difference is a steady increase in the world temperature due to climate change.
  - the_third_wave 2y ago
    That is nonsense, the climate has been changing all the time without the place burning down to the roots when it happened to be a bit warmer or not burning at all when it was cooler. These fires have nothing to do with 'climate change', they are caused by the lack of controlled burning which leads to an accumulation of combustible material on the forest floor. Once a fire starts - and fires start all the time, both from natural (lightning etc.) as well as man-made (PG&E cables, careless campers, smokers, fireworks, arson, etc.) causes - they quickly bloom into massive conflagrations due to the presence of all that combustible material. Increased habitation makes these massive fires more costly since fire consumes a McMansion just as readily as it does a Pacific pine.
    - polotics 2y ago
      You wrote "the climate has been changing all the time" It must have taken you so much effort and thinking to come up with such an illuminating, novel, and profound assertion. Here is something of that ilk: The statement "the climate has been changing all the time" is often used to downplay the significance of current climate change. While it's true that Earth's climate has undergone natural changes throughout its history, the current warming trend is different for several reasons: Rate of Change: The current rate of warming is unprecedented in the past several thousand years. Natural climate fluctuations typically occur over much longer timescales, allowing ecosystems and species to adapt gradually. The rapid pace of current change is making it difficult for many species to keep up, leading to disruptions in ecosystems and biodiversity loss. Cause of Change: While past climate change events were triggered by natural factors like volcanic eruptions or solar variations, the current warming trend is primarily driven by human activities, particularly the burning of fossil fuels. This has led to a significant increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, trapping heat and warming the planet. Magnitude of Change: The projected magnitude of future warming, if left unchecked, is likely to exceed the changes experienced during the past several million years. This could have severe consequences for human societies and natural ecosystems, including rising sea levels, more frequent and intense extreme weather events, and widespread species extinctions. Evidence: The overwhelming scientific consensus supports the conclusion that human activities are the primary cause of current climate change. This is based on a vast body of evidence from multiple independent lines of research, including temperature records, ice core data, and climate models. In summary, while the Earth's climate has naturally changed over long periods, the current warming trend is distinct in its rate, cause, magnitude, and supporting evidence. It is crucial to recognize the unique nature of human-induced climate change and take action to mitigate its impacts.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - vixen99 2y ago
        Your comment comes across as markedly authoritative. Are you a climate scientist with first hand knowledge? You appear to be repeating what we all read in countless reports almost daily from innumerable organizations and have done over the past few years. I'm pretty sure like many here I could probably offer an impromptu talk like this at the drop of a hat, covering the same points. I do wonder why we accept the reports from a number of rather distinguished climatologists and physicists who do not accept this 'scientific consensus'. Given the very significant swathe of the public who are convinced by the latter, why isn't this academic divide finally put to rest and the skeptics shown to be demonstrably wrong in their selection of data and their interpretations? It does not seem to happen. Why not? If this is an existential crisis I would have thought that such public debates at a very high level by extremely well-informed experts are well overdue. Yes, some occur but they are never definitive? "Current surveys may underestimate climate change skepticism evidence from list experiments in Germany and the USA" https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8262789/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8262789/
- aa-jv 2y ago
  The previous inhabitants knew all about these firestorms and used controlled burning to minimize their impact. Its probably going to be wise for future governors to consider re-learning this knowledge....
  - theultdev 2y ago
    No need to look back that far. They know to do use control burns, we've been doing it. It's forest management 101. But they get sued by environmentalists when they do.
- greentxt 2y ago
  You make it sound unidimensional but there is probably not 1 type of wildfire in California. Coastal residentially dense fires in chaperal are not the same things as massive fires burning in remote areas of national forrests in the sierras. There is no single cause or solution because they are totally different things, with different drivers and requiring different solutions.
jazzyjackson 2y ago
Who's presuming it's preventable? What little investment do you suggest California make? Probably slow controlled burns would be helpful in reducing potential fuel, but who's going to perform controlled burns over the entirety of all the hills surrounding LA ?
- defrost 2y ago
  I cannot answer the "who" but here in a region with similar vegetation and fire risk we don't cool burn the entirety, we stagger mosaic burns that break up the fire risk area into patches. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKsLRNbczJY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKsLRNbczJY
  - lazide 2y ago
    When I last talked to USFS folks, one big issue is complaints and even legal action from folks about smoke when they do burn. It’s a lose/lose situation for them.
    - defrost 2y ago
      That and insurance no doubt. What's needed is the reeducation of the NIMBY crowd .. I live in a state where many local community members are motivated to egage with local volunteer bush fire services and cool burning is less of an issue. As the urbanisation and luxury housing increases the resistance to "inconveniance" seems to also climb.
      - lazide 2y ago
        I doubt very much it’s a matter of lack of knowledge/education. Rather various degrees of ‘fuck you, I got mine’ and ‘it won’t happen to me because I’m special’. Which, often, is true enough they can keep doing it until they die, at which point they ‘win’. Sometimes though, either something happens and they ‘don’t have theirs’ anymore, or it becomes too clear it will happen to them - and some action occurs. Usually too late for it to be an easy or smooth change, of course.
hedora 2y ago
There are two issues. For thousands of years, indigenous people maintained the forest and small fires cleaned out the underbrush. The US halted maintenance, and suppressed fires, creating a backlog of fuel. The second issue is global warming. If you have any ideas on how to get the manpower necessary to perform 100+ years of backlogged forest maintenance spanning the entire west coast, or (better) how to fix global warming, I’d love to hear it. Also, desalination at the scale necessary to meet California’s demands is beyond current technology (especially if it’s done without destroying the ocean ecosystem). Note that the central valley relies on irrigation, and is the bread basket of the US.
- TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
  You can extinguish a fire with salt water. Connect the sewage / storm water system to a few massive pumps and back flush everything. Set off a few nukes in the bay to cause a tidal wave. I’m no civil engineer / hydrologished, so there’s probably issues with my drive-by dismissal of a serious issue.
  - calgoo 2y ago
    So yes, you can put out fires with salt water but its bad for any equipment that is currently being used * and it hurts the future plant life (salting the earth is an old method of hurting your enemies * ). * https://firefighterinsider.com/can-you-put-out-a-fire-with-seawater-does-it-work/ https://firefighterinsider.com/can-you-put-out-a-fire-with-s... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salting_the_earth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salting_the_earth
    - shwaj 2y ago
      I love how you respond seriously to the logistical challenges of salt water, and don’t blink at the prospect of using nukes to create a tidal wave.
    - TheSpiceIsLife 2y ago
      While we’re speaking about future plant life, it isn’t necessarily looking particularly good.
Redoubts 2y ago
The Sierra Club sues any attempt to do preventive burns. Forest management can take 4-7 years between planning and execution for any one task. https://x.com/tahrajirari/status/1877110097790312519 https://x.com/tahrajirari/status/1877110097790312519
pancakemouse 2y ago
> preventable Preventable via multiple methods, you've been downvoted presumably for seeming insensitivity, but it seems a valid question. Water is plentiful, it's a rich area. This stuff can be prevented. Why wasn't it?
gamblor956 2y ago
1) There wasn't a water shortage. The local reservoirs were full at the start of the fire. The problem was that there was so much simultaneous demand that there was insufficient water pressure. This was compounded by the destruction of pumping stations by the fire, and by the extreme winds preventing the use of aerial support (i.e., water and fire retardant) on Tuesday, when most of the Palisades were burned. 2) Salt water is highly corrosive to equipment, and also kills vegetation. But it used as a last resort when fresh water reservoirs are empty...and was used in previous Malibu fires... 3) For an example of how important aerial support is: the Sunset Fire and the Mt Wilson flameup of the Eaton fire were controlled within an hour each through the use of aerial water drops.

dheera 2y ago

> We download the reprojected data from UW SSEC's RealEarth program I really wish GOES's official images would provide the high resolution imagery directly. We shouldn't have to go through RealEarth to get it. However I've noticed that only RealEarth has the highest resolution images.

mackid 2y ago

Thanks for sharing. Do you work with the folks at Watch Duty?

xingyzt 2y ago
No, just a student on winter break who got curious why CA Fire's map wasn't showing the up-to-date extent of the Eaton fire. Do they have this kind of heat data?
- mackid 2y ago
  They integrate a number of sources. Satellite, cameras, weather, CalFire, etc. Check out their app, it’s free. They are a non-profit Startup, which is an interesting approach.

mzs 2y ago

Nice, thanks but did you know about NASA FIRMS? https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@-117.8,34.6,6.9z https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@-117.8,34...

xingyzt 2y ago
No, looks like they're doing a way better job! Thanks for sharing. I was only aware of the GOES sats. Seems like VIIRS is more intended to do this kind of monitoring.
- mzs 2y ago
  I still like what you did on break. FWIW GEOS provides Fire Temperature: https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/sector_band.php?sat=G18&sector=psw&band=FireTemperature&length=24 https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/sector_band.php?sat=G1...
pixelesque 2y ago
Interesting that FIRMS doesn't seem to yet be showing the "Sunset" fire, or anything West of Griffith Park...
- xingyzt 2y ago
  Maybe because FIRMS uses data from satellites in polar orbits, which only pass over the area once every few hours? With choosing near-Earth polar vs. farther geostationary orbits there's a tradeoff between space and time resolution.
notatoad 2y ago
FIRMS is very cool, but take it with a grain of salt - we were all looking at it obsessively while Jasper AB burned this summer, and apparently it has issues with differentiating between fire on the ground and fire in the smoke clouds, so it can make the fire boundary look bigger than it actually is.
dbetteridge 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

tikkun 2y ago

Another fire project idea: show, based on some kind of prediction model that gives 50th, 90th, 99th percentiles (from historical data, perhaps, or perhaps just from wind/fire speeds), how fast a given fire could reach a specific location. Whenever I've opened watch duty, that's always the question I'm asking. How long might it take to reach [here/there]?

lazide 2y ago
It’s a very dangerous answer to try to give someone, because of how unpredictable and dangerous a wildfire is. Sudden shifts in winds and can have the flames jump (literally) miles in minutes, after sitting calmly for hours. It isn’t theoretical either - it kills professionals too. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mann_Gulch_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mann_Gulch_fire], [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Canyon_Fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Canyon_Fire], [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dude_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dude_fire] for a few examples. Long story short - never turn your back on a wildfire, and try to stay as far away as possible.
- tikkun 2y ago
  Right, they seem highly volatile/variable. The thinking is that showing the 99th percentile / range of possibilities would cover that, if it's based on historical data - does that seem right to you or no, and if not why not?
  - lazide 2y ago
    It would be like if someone you never met came up to you and held a revolver to your head, and told you they were going to play Russian roulette. If they told you the 99% percentile odds of the next trigger pull, would it be okay to stay if you thought you liked the odds? And if you were silly enough to believe him, who would be to blame if he was wrong? Oh, here are some more [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarnell_Hill_Fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarnell_Hill_Fire]. Oh and [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Griffith_Park_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Griffith_Park_fire]. And [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Fire_of_1937 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Fire_of_1937] There is a reason why firefighters are considered to be one of the most heroic professionals. And some more (not all related to wildfires though) [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_deadliest_firefighter_disasters_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_deadliest_firefi...]

soundblaster 2y ago

cmap="inferno", lml