There are risks just about everywhere we can live in the world: earthquakes, hurricanes, flooding, tsunamis, tornadoes, volcanoes, etc… Today the YouDeparted team saw the risk of forest fire in South Lake Tahoe. Luckily for us, South Lake Tahoe is 20 miles away across Lake Tahoe, so we are not in any danger. Also, our servers are hosted at Rackspace’s data centers, far from any dangers here.
At about 3PM today during a hike, I noticed a small amount of smoke rising across the lake. The smoke appeared to be rising out of an area near Angora Lakes and Fallen Leaf Lake, just south of Lake Tahoe:
It is an area we are very familiar with as we have backpacked extensively in the area. Unfortunately, it is also covered by very thick underbrush, a result of decades of fire suppression.
Looking across the lake 20+ miles away, I can see the flames glowing in the sky. Reports put the total number of houses destroyed at 160+ and the total acres burning at 700+. Our hearts go out to all the poor people dealing with the fire tonight!
Here is a picture taken just a little while ago showing the flames visible across the lake:
Hopefully the winds will die down a bit and the fire fighters will have a chance to douse this fire! We wish our neighbors in South Lake Tahoe all the best!
Update 3:50PM, June 25th:
The fire has grown much larger and reports now put the total acreage at nearly 3000! Total numbers of homes destroyed is nearing 300, and a state of emergency has been declared.
Normally, you would see an excellent view of Tahoe from our deck, but today the smoke from the Angora Fire is completely obscuring it:
The smoky view in the mountains (remember, we are 20+ miles from the fire):
This entry was posted
on Monday, June 25th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
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