Southern California is Burning...Again

We've got a big fire going near the San Bernardino Mountains, and if it makes the move into the forested area, it may be nearly impossible to stop:

A wildfire that has already burned 40,000 acres and destroyed 100 buildings roared through high desert wilderness Thursday, threatening to merge with a fire in national forest land filled with dead, dry trees.

"If it starts in there it will be almost impossible to stop," California Department of Forestry spokeswoman Karen Guillemin said of the fire edging toward San Bernardino National Forest.

The blaze, about five miles from a 1,200-acre fire in the forest, was mainly consuming fast-burning fuel such as greasewood, Joshua trees and brush. If it expands from the high desert to the mountains, it could grow more devastating by burning millions of larger trees killed in recent years by a severe bark beetle infestation.

You can't imagine how many dead trees are up in that area. The last few times we've been up in the mountains it almost seemed like every third tree was dead, and although crews have been trying to cut them down and clear the forests, the job is monumental. There's still an awful lot of dead wood just waiting to explode.

The devastation we had in that area in 2003 will be small potatoes if this thing really takes off.