Andy Lacey
andy at minstersystems.co.uk
Thu Oct 25 09:15:09 CDT 2007
Sorry folks. I'm really interested in the discussion but with my mod's hat on I have to say that the Access content is a little on the low side. Please take this to OT if you want to continue. -- Andy Lacey http://www.minstersystems.co.uk --------- Original Message -------- From: "Access Developers discussion and problem solving" <accessd at databaseadvisors.com> To: "accessd at databaseadvisors.com" <accessd at databaseadvisors.com> Subject: Re: [AccessD] So Cal fires perspective Date: 25/10/07 13:59 John, This is an example of the kind of jumping to extremes that causes the toothpaste and nailclippers problem. I'm not saying that people should stand in the middle of an inferno with a garden hose!!! If your house has any significant fire going, get out. If your neighborhood is a firestorm, get out. If you can't breathe, get out. But in many cases, homes are lost (AND infernos grew into being) simply because no one was there to hold back small incipient fires, spread by few embers blowing. Certainly some people stay far too long and sometimes die--that is an error in judgment. But so is calling everyone with a garden hose an idiot. Situations vary, but the vast majority were FAR from any danger (much less near an inferno). "Evacuating a million people is the exact right thing to do rather than lose lives." Based on what? Look at the map I linked. Why not force 2 million from their non-endangered homes? Why not the whole county? Note that of the 5 people who died, there was one "idiot" (tried to save his home), and 4 old people who died as a result of the needless upheaval. Both extremes have costs. What was ACTUALLY needed was water drops (like they had in LA from the beginning), and many more reserve firemen. This exact same thing happened just 4 years ago, and it's certain to happen again soon. It seems they spent all their money on the database to evac the world, and none training volunteer/reserve firemen. There's no sense in that. Aside from the overreaction in forcing evacuations, and the vilifying of people who would reasonably try to protect their home (now outlawed), the real problem is that the groupthink that carries these overreactions eagerly buries the vast lack of actually addressing the real problems. Way too much reactionary evacuating, and way too little putting out fires. There's wasn't even anyone left to piece together a picture of where the fires were raging/threatening! Info is still very sketchy. Greg ------------------------------ Message: 11 Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2007 17:14:10 -0400 From: "jwcolby" <jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com> .... The shake shingle roofs which were quite common on the houses built in the 70s and 80s will catch fire from embers landing on the roofs. If these shingles are old and untreated they will catch fairly rapidly and once a patch of roof is engulfed no garden hose will put it out. A fully engulfed home can and will catch the house next door and in fact entire neighborhoods can go very quickly. People caught in those situations can quite easily die. Fires blown by high winds can "jump" hundreds of yards or even miles (in brush). In fact this is exactly how they jump the freeways which you would think would act as natural firebreaks and create natural boundaries; They can but all too often do not because of the winds. Thus a single house on fire can "cause" another house hundreds of yards away to burn. Watch the TV. A full fire crew CANNOT EXTINGUISH a fully engulfed home fire with entire engines available to them, all they can do is control and wet down the adjacent buildings to prevent the spread. Trained firemen die every year (encased in full on fire gear) because they get caught in the middle of a fire when the fire jumps over them and catches the brush around them. In fact firemen fighting brush fires are often provided "solar blankets" which can SOMETIMES save their lives by allowing them to hide under these blankets if they do get caught in a fire. I have never been inside of a real live burning structure but I have done the training with air packs and fire suits, going into training buildings with real fires (and LOTS of smoke) and even with suits designed to withstand 600 degree heat it is HOT and you can't see 2 inches in front of your face. Unprotected civilians in a fully engulfed burning neighborhood will die, if not from the flames and heat, then from smoke inhalation or even heart attacks. Evacuating a million people is the exact right thing to do rather than lose lives. Even worse is to lose firefighters trying to rescue the idiots that want to try and save their homes and get caught behind the fire line. A single house burning is nothing to mess with, a brush fire or an entire burning neighborhood whipped up by high winds can turn deadly in seconds, even for trained professionals. It is easy to criticize the effects of evacuations but in fact people die from these fires every year because they refuse to leave and try to save their home with garden hoses. Personally I don't mind if idiots die (cleansing the gene pool) but I object to firefighters dying trying to rescue the idiots. John W. Colby Colby Consulting www.ColbyConsulting.com -- AccessD mailing list AccessD at databaseadvisors.com http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com ________________________________________________ Message sent using UebiMiau 2.7.2