San Jacinto Mountain Communities

SUBJECT: Idyllwild & The Esperanza Fire
DATE: 23 November 2006
FROM: David R.W. Wadsworth <DRWWadsworth@gmail.com>

Thursday night, October 26th was a moderately stressful night. I was packed and ready to evacuate but WNKI, the local emergency radio station went off the air at 4:30 p.m. stating “the fire is 5.5 miles away and going west. Idyllwild/Pine Cove is not endangered."

I'm new to the mountains and my sense of direction at any given time is seriously messed up. I see San Jacinto Mountain out of my computer room window, which is almost due east. But 243 going to Pine Cove seems like it also run east an west and Pine Cove seems east of me. 243 doesn't and Pine Cove isn’t. 243 runs virtually north and south so my family and I were never in any danger.

It was disheartening to intellectually know that we weren't in any danger -- WNKI and the police would tell us if we were -- but being so disoriented I felt the fire was only 5.5 miles away. I spent the night looking for a Web Site that would show at least a graph of the fire in relation to various communities. I could find nothing.

The Esperanza Fire was a good dry run for Idyllwild area in that it pin pointed my deficiencies. 1) WNKI would broadcast round the clock or until they had to evacuate if there were in any danger -- intellectually I knew that but it was still disheartening when it went off the air, 2) Pine Cove is not east but north of northeast of Idyllwild, and 3) I need multiple sources of information. I'm a volunteer several disaster organizations on the hill but the first rule in any disaster preparedness is take care of yourself and your family first.

Maybe I'm asking for too much but does anyone know of a web site that will show a graph of a fire in relation to various communities and keep it updated?

David R.W. Wadsworth

DAS IDYLLWILD SCHONGEBIET
MAILING ADDRESS: P.O. Box 617
SHIPPING ADDRESS: 25685 Big Pine
Idyllwild, CA 92549

(951) 659-0130

DRWWadsworth@gmail.com

I understand what you mean. When I frist moved to Big Bear I had no idea where anything was in relation to where I lived, and I didn't yet have a sense of how far away anything was, or what exactly it means to hear that a fire is five miles away. I now realize that five miles as the crow flies can also mean a couple ridges or a mountain or two between me and a fire.

Have you looked at the map on this site: http://www.rimoftheworld.net/gallery/image/6014
There may also be links to other maps in the threads about the Esperanza Fire. Those would be mostly in the "Fire" threads under the "News" or "Incidents" heading. I bumped up the Esperanza thread under incident for you.

This is about the best place I have found for gathering information on fires in the area. While I find bits and pieces on other websites, it seems that sooner or later all of those bits and pieces show up here in the threads on a particular fire or on the Alerts page. We have some awsome volunteers who ferret this info out and post here for us.