Keep Santa Paula & Ventura CA in your thoughts!

Well, I've tried all kinds of tricks to try to get a visual on my hood, but the authorities won't let me pass. I even tried impersonating an insurance adjuster (using the card from my Nationwide agent) but no luck. So I'm up in a SLO County in a hotel until things clear up. At least the air is breathable and the wine is good. The good news is insurance covers all our expenses while evacuated!
 
I just read an update from about 2 hours ago. Things are going from bad to worse. The Thomas Fire is now the 3rd largest in history. Mandatory evacuations in Santa Barara County. Looks like the hills outside of Montecito are in peril. My prayers and sympathy to everyone out there
 
Yeah, it has become another major shit storm since 6 this morning when the winds picked up (65mph...like a fire hurricane). My parents were finally evacuated as the they are S. of E. Valley rd. and it was included since the fire is roaring down the hill, but I can't imagine the fire getting that far into town. Lots of homes would have to burn first. However, you know things are serious when Oprah's place gets included in the mandatory evacuation! To be safe, we spent the early morning moving my parents valuables to a storage unit in Goleta. I still can't get into my own neighborhood, but the fire seems to have moved west of it. Watch and wait is all we can do. Insurance company has been great, the wife didn't pack many clothes thinking this would only be a few days and they said to take her shopping and they would cover it!

Here's a scene from on the ground today showing how fast the wind carries embers around homes and what a great job the firefighters (from all over the country) are doing under ridiculous circumstances. People say they have a truck in every driveway:
 
Last edited:
Good news, evac. was lifted this morning and we all got up to our homes. Ours was thankfully unscathed, just a bunch of very fine soot everywhere. The strong winds drove it into the house, through any cracks it could find. In the process of getting cleaning set up, as my LP collection is at this house and they were cleaned spotless before I put them away (goal is to play holiday records for X-mas). My wife was smart enough to throw sheets over our equipment and the TVs in the house before she evacuated so no issues there. Her white (now light grey) upholstered furniture may be un-salvagable however. All in all, I'm amazed at how well the firefighters did as we poked around the neighborhood.
Screen Shot 2017-12-21 at 4.13.30 PM.png
 
Last edited:
Amen. My mom and sis went home to Ventura and their place is OK as well. I haven’t heard back from my Aunt & Uncle in Montecito as yet.
 
Amen. My mom and sis went home to Ventura and their place is OK as well. I haven’t heard back from my Aunt & Uncle in Montecito as yet.
They should be good, we didn't lose many around here. They'll be coming home to a lot of soot though, particularly if they are up near E. Mountain Dr.. PM me if they need a cleaning service. I found a group cleaning a local church today that specializes in fire damage clean up (using EPA filters and such). They are doing our place tomorrow.
 
They should be good, we didn't lose many around here. They'll be coming home to a lot of soot though, particularly if they are up near E. Mountain Dr.. PM me if they need a cleaning service. I found a group cleaning a local church today that specializes in fire damage clean up (using EPA filters and such). They are doing our place tomorrow.
Thanks
 
And now for round two,... the cruel twist of fate; the rains.
We're supposed to get upward of 2", in northern San Diego County between tonight and tomorrow.

Got sandbags and waddles?

now at 3"+ and raining hard (3:45pm tuesday)
final tally: 3.5" at the base of Red Mountain, east of Fallbrook, in under 24 hours.
 
Last edited:
And now for round two,... the cruel twist of fate; the rains.
We're supposed to get upward of 2" in San Diego County between tonight and tomorrow.

Got sandbags and waddles?
Yeah, we were actually mandatory evacuated again here in Santa Barbara. Fortunately, all our belongings (as of Friday) have been removed to a cleaning/storage facility. I'm out in Colorado (currently experiencing a drought) and the wife is in a rental up north, our lives have been on hold for weeks, so I'm at the point where I don't care anymore. My insurance co. has been awesome and nobody has been hurt so all is OK. My parents are right at the border of evacuation and they have decided to ride it out. They've evacuated thousands again and proclaimed an emergency...fingers crossed for all! On a minor, but forum-relevant note, we are still trying to figure out what to do about the record collection: the stuff stored in bins in the garage is fine; the stuff that was on the shelves is soot/smoke damaged, but there is no way I trust the furniture/fire reclamation service to clean them. Working with insurance to claim loss, but they have no clue about the value, nor the value of the vintage equipment (which, frustratingly, without powering it up, I have no idea how it was affected). Life goes on.
SANTA_BARBARA_COUNTY_PROCLAIMS_LOCAL_EMERGENCY_DUE_TO_SEVERE_WINTER_STORMS_Page_1.jpg
 
Last edited:
Wow!
*2.5" of rain overnight in northern San Diego County, at least by my rain gauge.

*just nudged over 3" in 18hours or so.
 
Last edited:
Well, we had a nice house...(pics from mom sent this morning). I'm headed back to see what I can do. With no flood insurance, I'm afraid it's going to be difficult. Everybody immediate to me are OK though, but I hear they are extracting bodies from homes that slid a few roads over on Hot Springs.
IMG_0901.JPG IMG_0900.JPG
 
Last edited:
So very sorry to see your predicament.
Its also very sad about the people who died.

Back in the '69 rain year (a standard to compare to, still), I saw the results of a really nasty mud/landslide. My uncle lived on a ridge of a very deep canyon. That canyon had a road that led up it to access the area. Both sides of the canyon had houses up it along the road.
We'd heard about a deadly landslide on the news, and saw footage of the devastation. The slide literally blew a hole through a two story house, and passed on through it. It started at the top of the ridge across from my uncles side of the canyon, and came down through the house. This was directly across from his place, and easily viewed from their place. It was kind of weird to see the news report of it, and then to be there, maybe even the same day? I was 10, and don't recall the timeline; just the recollection of the event..

phantomrebel,... best wishes to you in all of this.
 
Thanks Mike and John. Hard to believe the tragedy. Nobody can get to my house (fortunately vacant as all furniture was just taken out by service for fire restoration and wife is up the coast), and I assume it is just as bad, but my parents are devastated. My mom can't stop thinking about her fish...she had about 50 prized koi in a pond that wrapped around the side of the house. She babied them every day and now they are gone, as is all the landscape. Hard to believe...this is the before to the previous "after" pictures above to give you an idea of the devastation:
valleyrd.jpg
 
I've dealt first hand with how intense run-off flows can be. It was due to a huge oversight in a grading plan of a 36hole Jack Nickaluas designed gold course/resort development; one that included no sandbags around miles of perimeter, and, the removal of an entire hill that separated our community from a drainage area, 250+acres, that would have never been able to get to us. That drainage, ran north to south naturally (but was changed to flow east towards us). But, they removed a hill, and turned that whole other canyon drainage onto us at 100% without a single sandbag in place. I've got pictures of what appeared to be a large western river flowing east into our community, and dumping mud, and clogging hillside drainage systems. And not a single sand bag to be seen.
I'd go so far as to suggest collusion between the county grading supervisor (who was set to retire in minimal time; a month?), and the golf course developer.
Why would a soon to retire golf enthusiast, grading inspector, have interest in backing a 36hole Jack Nicklaus desgined gold course?
Nope, he insisted that they'd done nothing wroing, despite not having a single sandbag in place months after that hard set deadline (literally miles of sandbags two courses high would have been required, just around the perimeter).
This was storm one of the '97/'98 EL Nino cycle (massive!), and, we had giant storms stacked up to Japan. I personally bought several thousand dollars worth of sandbags, and built a military grade bunker encampment at the edge of a giant cribwall, whose drain had been destroyed; and I built an 85' long drain channel down a 2:1 cut slope that I lived at the edge of, and was endanger of coming off of. A long, long, story of months of intensity followed. I was out in every drop, checking miles of drainage and cleaning out filters that I built.
Everyone, at least the experts, told me my efforts would fail, including our own civil engineer, the grading development, and the county engineer. They insisted theirs was right, and mine would fail.
Me: Real background working at a ski resort, and, being part of the crew that was tasked with keeping slope runoff out of a creek with endangered cutthroat trout.

There "injuneered" effort failed with the first heavy mist.
Mine, with my sandbags and chicken wire and stakes, and a 100' piece of 6" pipe, got us through nearly 40" of rain, without a hiccup.

I'm hesitant to ask, but, obviously, you're near some form of flow area?
Or, was that just one of those cruel twists of fate, delivered?

Beautiful place! wow.

I feel for your mom. I built a goldfish pond that I maintained for at least 15 years, before the fish started passing of old age, and the waterfall filter return flow needed fixing (we sold the house, and I disassembled the pond)..
Those things are pets, and that sucks.
 
Last edited:
All of Montecito is a series of creeks coming from the mountain range sloping to the beach. Everybody is in a flow area, and there have been bad storms, but nothing like this, since there is no vegetation left on the mountainside after the fire to hold any water. Here's a live shot of the 101 freeway right now in this area to give you an idea (as you've likely driven this many times):
Screen Shot 2018-01-09 at 2.24.18 PM.jpg
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom