Not on Fire

As bad as it is, it could be worse. The pictures from Southern California these past couple days have looked literally hellish, but the fires are not universal. Geography has everything to do with it.

L.A. proper sits in a bowl, surrounded by mountains on three sides (the Santa Monicas, the San Gabriels), with the Pacific Ocean on the fourth side. The fires are in the mountains and canyons, to the north and south. Malibu is to to the north, a case where canyons essentially run right down to the sea, which is how residents get those spectacular views. There are canyon communities all over the area, and they are, most of the time, spectacular places to live (when I first came here, I stayed for three months with some friends in Topanga Canyon, immediately south of Malibu, and loved it). But if there's a fire, those canyons becomes rivers of flame, with results that have been seen time and again.

So if you live there, it can get very bad very fast, because the geography of the canyons provides channels that essentially funnel the flames in a specific direction. At the same time, the mountains doing the funnelling typically protect other areas, unless the flames climb to a ridgeline and flying embers set another area on fire. (Which has in fact been happening quite a lot, which is why three fires became thirteen so quickly.)

But I live in the bowl that is L.A. proper. The mountains are visibly in every direction, and I live toward the northern end of the bowl--on my bike, I can start climbing the Sepulveda Pass into the Santa Monica Mountains in about twenty minutes. (And a mighty workout it is, although the trip back is fabulous--three miles without peddling!) But the only scenario by which my place could catch fire would be the true nightmare: a Chicago-in-1871 conflagration where the whole city is aflame, embers leaping from rooftop to rooftop. It's not impossible, but it is unlikely.

In fact, just standing outside, I can barely see any evidence of the fires. The sky to the west is a little yellow, but to the east it's a lovely blue. My throat has been burning since late Sunday night, and my breathing seems a little shallow sometimes, but that's it. The same Santa Ana winds that caused all of this are blowing most of the smoke due west, out over the ocean. So that's something, at least.

But for now, no real problems here. (Note the qualifier...)