Fire Investigators Narrow Down Start Point

Incredible photo. Thanks Ray for sharing your intimate knowledge of local geography during extreme as well as normal times.

spontaneous combustion of fresh cut grass...it can happen. I remember as a kid my dad would pile up the grass in the back yard after cutting it....that stuff would get super hot on a hot day.

You have to bury the grass quite deep before combustion will occur. And I suspect people lugging tools up there weren't composting their clippings on site.

Amazing. What a resource you are, Ray. Thanks so much.

I hope the person(s) responsible will step forward rather than have to be identified by others. Sounds like there was the intention to do good, not to harm. Thinking someone had set this fire intentionally was much worse.

I was away from town and cannot say how grateful I am to the Independent for its coverage. My iphone got a lot of use. The paper and all the reporters on the fire should win an award. Ray is definitely my choice for a local hero award this year.

Don't you have to get a permit to work gas powered tools in the wilderness? There should be huge fines for anyone caught operating such tools without proper oversight or permissions, no matter how good the intentions may be. Luckily no one was killed or seriously injured. But the heartbreak of it all....

We do a lot of clearing on our property and a weedwacker with a large diameter string(.130" diameter) is generally safe to use. Just to be sure we check the spark arrester and fuel lines and have a 3 gallon water pressurized fire extinguisher, a shovel, and a cell phone. Anything with a smaller string won't cut the brush, so people use metal blades, which will throw sparks when you hit a rock, which is all the time. A fire chief warned me about metal blades, since he had been to over a dozen fires started by metal blades. These can only be used when the temperature is low and the humidity is high (I measure it with a handheld Kestrel unit_

Thanks Ray for your incredible service during these times and in-between!

mtnlion, good info to know about weedwackers.

I understand that some bureaucratic problems delayed the water drops, so it seems to me that next time (and there will be one) there ought to be a lookout helipad on La Cumbre Peak and perhaps a rotating pilot team similar to the lovely couple who lived up there in the lookout with their binoculars during the sixties. They were probably better than satelites.
I know the cost would be prohibitive.......

Thanks Ray and the rest of the Independent staff for your super reporting. In case you didn't see it, at http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/200..., SusanG wrote:

"The best hour-by-hour coverage of the Jesusita Fire has been offered by the Santa Barbara Independent, a local alternative weekly. Their reporters have been swarming the area, relaying information into their newsroom and out onto the web from ridge lines, at the evacuation shelters, at fire service headquarters ... even riding bicycles through burned-out neighborhoods and taking down addresses of houses saved and lost. It's been an incredible tour de force of vital information in service of a community in need.

I'm guessing their staff didn't get the memo that "high-end journalism is dying" just because metro dailies are going broke."

KPFA uses an electric-powered weed whacker in the Berkeley hills, where fires are also a major concern.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlewl6...

Very good reporting throughout. I checked The Independent every day. I have a SB Newspress account and checked there too, but I got far more timely and detailed info from The Independent. It was an invaluable resource.

I would suggest one (minor) thing. During the Gap Fire, The Independent had a huge banner at the top of the page. The Jesusita Fire's banner was a bit buried in the middle and smaller, thus harder to find.

Thank you for the great reporting!

I cannot believe the shameless self promotion of this guy let alone the gushing of some of the previous comments

Sunnyday what's wrong someone take your mojo?

No need for self-combustion of whacked grass. Just set down the weed whacker for a brief rest and you have all the fire you wanted and more. Seen it happen on the neighbor's property, fortunately it was put out after only 40-50 sqft burned...

I'm just wondering in the beginning of the fire there was all kinds of rumors some of the media was throwing out there..One reporter said something about gunshots in the area, he heard something on the scanner..One man was interviewed and he stated he heard a loud explosion..Another peron said they saw what looked to be an explosion...Can a weedwacker do this sort of thing? Did anything become of the "Shots fired" deal? I heard it was in the same area the fire started at the same time.

Ray, please ignore the rude comments of trailuser!

YOU have been an incredibly reliable source of the best, most up-to-date information during the Zaca, Gap, Tea and Jesusita Fires - the most reliable source! And I and so very many others can't thank you enough for gathering the news we need to know and getting it to us as quickly as humanly possible. You put yourself in harms way to do it too and are in every waya local hero, year in and year out!! THANK YOU RAY and the incredible team at our best source for news, The S.b. Independent!!

Ray Ford has been nothing but an unending source of information with respect to trails and the back-country of Santa Barbara for many years.This story was to share with the readers of the Independent, the timing and photos of the start of the fire as he had experienced it. Nothing more, nothing less. And the story ends with a request for others to share what information they have, or their experiences.

Excellent report Ray, and you are absolutely on track. I was at the top of San Roque Road by 2 PM (my home is less than 1/4 mile away) and clearly saw the point of origin. Unfortunately, I did not see anyone on the trail up there, and did not have my binoculars as I was more interested in the fire and evacuating.

There were reports on the two-way at the time of someone running down the trail in an erratic fashion and hiding in the bushes. I do not know what came of that.

Maybe this isn't the time to start this conversation, but for the last several years I've been frustrated with over zealous trail maintenance. Beautiful single track trails being widened to double tracks, and in some places like rattlesnake beyond that, even drilled out sandstone boulders on creek crossings. All in a, so called, wilderness area, I guess so horses or mules can negotiate easier. Special interest groups now seem to be on annual widening parties. What are the regulations in this regard?

I totally agree with 'easternpacific' above.
What the author of this story recently did to the Cold Springs trail with his backhoe is a prime example of over-maintenance and it is a travesty.
Maintenance is actually not the right word, reworking is a better description.
These areas invariably erode severely in subsequent rains whereas the original unmaintained portions of trail are well worn-in and usually very resilient.
We saw this on Jesusita a few years ago when 200+ people went up the trail and arbitrarily hacked away with little direction and predictable (to me) results.
I say leave the trails in a natural state (brush clearing and obvious shore up work exempted of course)
If you like a preened environment, go for a walk at Alice Keck.

"Somebody running down the trail and hiding in the bushes? All this sounds alittle weird to me."..As it was in the Painted Cave fire, first there was the dump on fire heard on the scanner of ashes and cardboard on fire floating over the city one piece going as far as the railroad tracks at Milpas behind the Red Lion and lighting up brush..But they had a suspect although they couldn't prove this fella started the painted cave fire he was sued...Well everyone did a wonderful job of saving our town but I don't know if I believe the weedwacker story was the weedwacker left behind???

I would also like to thank Ray and the independent for their coverage on this (and past) fires. You have been the only source of accurate and up to date info. As for the trail maintenance issue, I appreciate the work that is done by all of the volunteer groups that keep the trails clear. Trailuser, when you say leave the trail in its "natural state", wouldn't that would be no trail? Is that what you are advocating? Eastern Pacific, I would hardly call the SB front country "wilderness", as some days it is like a pedestrian mall on the local trails. If you want the wilderness experience you should drop over to the backside where you can enjoy hours of hiking without seeing any other souls.

Torotoro
I would contend that foot traffic on a trail ensures the existence of the trail - no maintenance needed.
I have probably used every front country trail at least once in any given month for the last 15 years or more.
It is unforgivable (and a little hubristic) when one person arbitrarily decides that we need to tear out rocks, boulders, etc. and create dirt switchbacks where none had ever existed or were necessary before (see lower Buena Vista or Jesusita above the ranch).
Both these sections of trail have see dramatically more wear than the natural rockier part of the trail they replaced.
If this is to be done, there should be some oversight at least and not have a small group of people decide what everyone else has to tolerate.

Torotoro - Rattlesnake canyon is a designated wilderness area. That's the problem with 4' wide tails, dog sh-- and unleashed dogs etc. If you'd like to see steelhead spawn, and clean water in Mission Creek, it all starts in the headwaters up in Rattlesnake canyon. There's probably 30 dogs / day up there minimum. Keep it clean, pack out everything, leave the trails single-track.

People seem to be on the entitlement plan now-a -days.

I hope someone investigates why it took so long for a fire truck to drive up the power-line dirt road and hose down the fire. It seems the response to this fire was political and not urgent.

It sure is easy to Monday morning quarter back, isn't it?

We should all be grateful that there were not more serious injuries or death. The rest is just 'stuff" that can be rebuilt or replaced.

Let' s keep the issue of life and death ahead of property, or wanking about the amount of trail clearance is "right"......