The Unhappy Me thread

[Uncwilly]

I can post a pic on imgur and include a link in a pm, if anyone wants to see.

[Uncwilly]

So, Sunday I went off to church family camp. It was supposed to last until Saturday. We had to evacuate ahead of a fire (2 lane road ~40 km to the security check point.) Arsonist has been caught. Over 400 of us at our camp, several other organized camps (some are youth camps), and at least 4 or 5 campgrounds are all evacuated. The local town too. This is 5 years after we had to improvise a day and a half before camp because of a fire. That was the first time in ~60 years that we weren't at the same camp.

Several of our folks are from other countries/continents/hemispheres (some in their 80's). Dozens of "local" homes have been opened to visitors from far and wide. The most of local homes of church members are 150-200 km from the security check point. Various caravan trailers were left behind in the evac. (including the one that was involved in my recent injury.) 1000's of monetary units worth of sound equipment and other support items, and most personal clothing, suitcases, etc. were left on site. People who had been dropped off by family had to be seen to. Etc.

Mobile phones were buzzing with SMS and social media was great to let family around know about the situation and share news.

If anyone wants to know specifics, pm me.

[chalsall]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

People who had been dropped off by family had to be seen to. Etc.

Holy shit dude! I hope you and yours are OK.

[kladner]

You have been on a pretty rocky stretch of the road, recently. I hope it smooths a bit, and soon.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by chalsall

Holy shit dude! I hope you and yours are OK.

Yes, and don't know.

3200 total people were evacuated. The evacuation area has been enlarged since that figure was published, but it only should add less than 500. The containment % went down recently (length of bare earth with burnt on one side and unburnt on the other divided by total perimeter). Wide-body jet based craft have been dropping retardant. I saw crews head that way this morning from the nearest major metro area over 5 hours away.

Then this evening I got word that another branch of the family in a different area had to flee their home due to a different wildfire. At one point all fire crews were pulled from all other duties to only protect those being evacuated. This is near a major lake, so the flying boat type water tankers might be used.

[MisterBitcoin]

Weekend is over (too short, as always...); soon I have jump into the next week.
Germany could get an new temperature record; the "old" one is at 40,3°C. In some regions experts say the temperature might reach 40°C.
Anyway; Tuesday´s plan is changing technical equipment from an chemical site. These equipment is close to the roof; in an sun exponated area.

Additionally HAZMAT suite and respirator are a requirement; sounds like fun.
It´s hard work, but I like it.

[xilman]

Windoze update broke my observatory controller. Symptoms exactly like PSU or thermal or RAM problems so spent many hours investigating those first. After ~24 hours work seem to have got things up and running again. Fingers crossed ...

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by MisterBitcoin

Additionally HAZMAT suite and respirator are a requirement; sounds like fun.

Water, water, 1/4 strength electrolyte beverages, portable shade structure, cross check your coworkers often, hopefully you have a person doing health checks as you in and come out. If you have a spare decon sprayer or hose, spray cool water on the person after they are out the suit. Hopefully you get low humidity.

I have been out in 50C weather. And have been out doing safety work with coveralls, respirator, hearing protection, hardhat, and about 22 kilos of other associated gear. When I did a 40 hr Hazmat training last year, it was hot enough that we did all of our suit up practice in the shade..

[ewmayer]

Best wishes for getting some semblance of normal lives back soon, Uncwilly. Appropriately, I had just finished reading the following article on one of my favorite econo-blogs before hitting the M-forum today:

Could California Flame Out? | Wolf Street

Not so very long ago I thought that global warming was a tragedy of epic proportions, but that it would have at least a few winners: Southern California might become truly unbearable, but Eureka would be the next Laguna Beach. I was wrong again. Writing in the New York Times about Montana, Sara Vowell summarized it like this, “Here in the Mountain West, there are no longer four seasons, only two: winter and wildfire.”

While not that apocalyptic, California’s wildfire season has been starting earlier and ending later. In the past, the season lasted a couple months, August through early October. This year it began the first week of July and last year–the deadliest and costliest wildfire season ever–it went on forever, finally petering out in the north in November and still devastating the south as late as December. The Thomas fire in Southern California, the largest single fire ever, broke out on December 4th.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by ewmayer

Best wishes for getting some semblance of normal lives back soon, Uncwilly.

Well, I can update my (and my family) situation with good news. The fire that I had to flee from is all but contained. The Monday after we left we were able to go in and retrieve all of our belongings. It was a mixed bunch of retirees, those with understanding bosses, 'house wives', students {who gave up a planned outing to a local amusement park that is done every year on the Monday after camp}, those with alternate work schedules, those with flexible jobs (self employed, top level bosses, and business owners), some lay abouts, and a few that made it after work. My relative has a boss that previously worked at the camp and was very understanding. I have an alternate work schedule and my supervisor was quite understanding. We took to vehicles up, so we could take more items down. Some items came home with those that will eventually get them to the rightful owner. As of today the roads in the area are all open, but some locations require escort as road work is underway.
Many of us got in before the towns people did. As we left it was locals only still in town, no tourists like would be normal at that time of day, day of the week, and season of the year. The town earned praise in the big regional newspaper/website for being prepared. In the past few years they have done a tremendous amount of work prepping. The camps were particularly called out for praise. Some of them had nearly completely got everyone away before the official evacuation notification came. The staff at these camps had to get us away safe, prep the camp by closing up and locking all buildings. then leave their home. Then a few days in they opened up some of the cabins to the firefighters to sleep in (my personal items were moved to another place to make the cabin I slept in available to firefighters.)

My relative that fled the much larger fire is home with their immediate family. That fire is about 2/5ths contained. It has burnt an area roughly the size of a square 25km on a side. Their deep freeze was without power for an undetermined amount of time. So, all of the food will be donated to the local waste receptacle. As of this moment over 1000 residences have been totally lost and over 500 other buildings lost or damaged (including homes).

WRT my injuries. The hand surgeon, after a new set of x-rays, has released me from the splint. The stitches are to stay in until at least Thursday. Healing progress is going well. Just getting the tendons back to working order (they tend to freeze up when not exercised routinely.) Still on full restriction with the hand (for work, although I can drive and type no problem.)

So, overall, most things are back to normal for me, and starting to return to normal for the relatives.

[pinhodecarlos]

Feeling sad about:

Italy bridge: Genoa motorway collapse kills at least 22



https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45183624