There is a wild fire burning southeast of the Phoenix area in the town of Kearny. I mentioned in the Hobo Camp thread today that there have been several structures and at least three homes destroyed so far. There are tracks running through the town, and I saw video of a tank car being run down the tracks with someone on top spraying the fire. I found these photos on another stations website. BTW, they also have several tankers and two helicopters assisting the train in battling this fire :

I know it's been really hot out your way ,Don ,.....can these things start spontaneously or do they need a little help from a match or possibly lightning ?

T

There are two ways they start, one by lightning strikes, the second by humans, some even intentionally. And yeah, they are investigating the start of this one since there hasn't been any sign of storms for a while now. The heat doesn't help either, but it also makes it hard on the firefighters themselves. Right now they have some 200 of them fighting this fire, but they're gearing up for a heavy wildfire season, many are in the tall pines where the heat isn't as intense as it is in the desert. Right now we're looking at yet another 115 degree day here, while in Kearny where the fire is, they're only looking at 110 for today.

One problem I see for this Fire Train is that there are no radiant heat shields for the protection of crew using the monitor unit, ie the nozzle.
The majority of bushfire units here in Australia now have radiant heat shields as well as self defense vehicle sprinklers and low water alarms, these improvements as well as changes to attack techniques, came about following crew deaths in fires in the Ash Wednesday Fires of 1983 and others since.
The results were no Fire fighter deaths during the Black Saturday fires of 2009, mind you there were some close calls.
Black Saturday resulted in the deaths of 173 people and 2029 homes being destroyed.
Lets hope that nothing like that occurs again.

Mark

Living in the middle of a forest myself I hate to see these things. When people start them on purpose (not saying that's the case here) if they are caught they should be shot!

Tyson Rayles Wrote:Living in the middle of a forest myself I hate to see these things. When people start them on purpose (not saying that's the case here) if they are caught they should be shot!

A lot of people feel that way. One of the largest fires here in Arizona took place in 2002. One reserve firefighter decided if he started a fire, he'd be called up and paid to fight it. Around the same time, a stranded motorist decided she would start a fire to attract a passing newscopter. Well, the two fires got out of hand and eventually combined to burn close to 500,000 acres of forest. In 2011, there was yet another human-caused fire in the pines burning some 538,000 acres. I also get upset when I hear that some people fight forest management, including clearing out the underbrush and thinning trees to keep things like this from spreading so quickly. We even have some that fight cutting down the burned trees to salvage some for lumber and other uses and to clear the area for new trees. This is not going to be a good year for wildfires, we've got four others burning around Arizona right now, California, New Mexico and Alaska have their share as well.

We think of Arizona as a desert oasis. Down here it is, but up north, we have the largest stand of ponderosa pine in the country.

Don't, that's just a unique train!! Just the thing to place out on a spur, for a little added interest on the layout!! Do you know how the pump gets powered? Guess it could be electric, air, stand alone diesel??? Prolly could scrounge the nozzle stand from an HO firetrucks or... Scratch??

Quote: A lot of people feel that way. One of the largest fires here in Arizona took place in 2002. One reserve firefighter decided if he started a fire, he'd be called up and paid to fight it. Around the same time, a stranded motorist decided she would start a fire to attract a passing newscopter. Well, the two fires got out of hand and eventually combined to burn close to 500,000 acres of forest.

We think of Arizona as a desert oasis. Down here it is, but up north, we have the largest stand of ponderosa pine in the country.

What are people using for brains these days? I'm not even going to try and call it "common sense" any more because we all know that common and sense no longer belong together.
So the stranded motorist decided that having a mobile phone was no longer a suitable means of summoning help, a smoke signal would work better? :wait: These guys express how I feel so very well.

Ponderosa pine; are we going to build a wagon and paint it?

Mark
Oh dear just as I post this, my morning coffee decides to try going down the wrong way, coffee spluttered everywhere.