California's largest ever fire – force that could not be stopped

[Tony Koretz]

California’s largest ever fire was a force that could not be stopped

The Thomas fire became California’s largest by size since modern recordkeeping began, standing at over 281,900 acres as of Friday. It raced from the urban edge to deep into the Los Padres National Forest like no fire before it, covering huge distances unobstructed and mostly unseen. The neighborhoods and cities that sit at the foot of these steep ranges — the Santa Ynez, Topatopa, Sierra Madre — had no vantage to the immense wilderness beyond the first ridge or two, no real grasp of what was seething out of sight.

When the fire came over those ridges again and again, to eat homes across a 55-mile swath of civilization, they had to confront that buried seed of doom that Californians forever try to forget: We settled in a dangerously temperamental land.

While we have fought to subdue its mood swings with human ingenuity — canals, levies, dams, injection wells, seismic retrofits, debris basins, brush clearance, tile roofs, hotshot crews, air drops — our efforts are feeble compared to what has and will come.

Read more http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-epic-fires-california-20171231-story.html

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