September 11, 2024 • 20 mins
Bill talks with former Fire Captain Chuck Lovers about how fire crews go about approaching these fires and talks with KFI reporter Corbin Carson about the ongoing fires in Southern California: Line Fire (San Bernardino County, Bridge Fire (Angeles National Forest), Airport fire (Trabuco Canyon, CA), Roblar fire (Camp Pendleton)Dr. Jim Keany, Co-Director of the Emergency Room at Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, joins The Bill Handel Show for 'Medical News'! Dr. Keany talks with Bill about OC Health Care Agency issuing health advisory as smoke from local wildfires cause unhealthy air quality and signs of heat stroke you should know.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty the bill Handle
Show on demand on the iheartradiop And this is KFI
AM six forty bill Handle here on a Wednesday morning,
September eleventh, nine eleven.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Twenty three years ago. Today.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Last night the debate, of course, which we're going to
be talking about, I'm sure for the rest of the
day and probably for the rest of the campaign, the
presidential campaign, and I talked about that this morning seven
and seven twenty for the first half hour of the show.
And then the other big story is the fires that
are happening in southern California.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
And we have Blake Trolley at the Bridge fire.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Michael Monk is going to report from the Line fire
in San Bernardino, Corbyn Carson at the Airport fire. And
one of the things that Blake talked about was how
the fire in the Angelus National Forests has increased by tenfold.
And I had asked him, you know, what do you
do when it's blowing that quickly?
Speaker 2 (01:02):
What a firefighters do? And I'm asking Chuck Lovers.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Chuck has been a friend of mine for twenty five
years and has worked for La County Fire.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
He've been on the front lines for all of those years.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Chuck, thanks for taking the time to just and a hello.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
We haven't talked in a while.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Good morning, Bill. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Let me ask and this is one of the questions
I asked Blake, And of course he's not a firefighting expert.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Is there a point when a fire is going this quickly?
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Where and if it's going in the right direction you
just sit back and see where it's going to go,
or you always looking at fighting.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
We're going to stop it, We're going to move it
in that direction. How does that work?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Well, we can't stop the wind, and so we have
to kind of step aside for our own safety. If
it's going in a direction that is not going to
hurt people, that's okay. But if it's going in a
direction of a village or a school or something, we
will try to send troops out in way in advance
of the fire and try to mitigate any fire hazards
(02:07):
around those structures. So we'll do what we can, and
then once it hits, we will try to protect those structures.
The engine crews with the hoses and stuff will wet
things down as best they can. When the winds are blowing,
it's a little difficult. You know, the hose stream doesn't
go straight anymore, it binds. But we you know, we
(02:29):
do what we can with nature.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
What do you do?
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You know, when do you just give up the ghost
and saying it's moving too quickly, it's burning too hot.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
We're going to just let it.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
We are simply going to let it do its thing,
even with structures or you always fighting if structures are involved.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Well, we're always trying to do something. If structures are
involved and people are involved, we always try to do something.
And it's true, maybe we can't be right in the
middle of the mix, and maybe we're going to work
for on the fringes, but we never never say we
can't do anything. Now, if life and property are is
not a problem, then we will mostly just flank the
fire and catch it when the wind's side down or
(03:08):
when the when the sun goes down, and maybe get
some recovery at night. We do our best work at night.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
And when you hear zero percent contained, thirty percent contained,
what does that actually mean?
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Well, contain just means the line the guys that are
on the ground, what I was doing cutting a hand line,
that's containment. And you know you may start off, a
fire might be twenty percent contained in the early earliness
of the fire, and then the winds come up and
it blows up, and now that twenty percent is only
two percent because the fire has grown that much.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
And so when you're looking at these and this thing
is growing as quickly as as this one has. I mean,
I've never heard of a fire going ten times overnight.
I've heard of doubling, tripling. But when it explodes at
ten times, you reach a point where you just go,
this is beyond our control at this point, and it's
(04:02):
going to do what it's going to do. And let's
figure out what happens when we happen to be able
to do something. Does that make any sense, Chuck?
Speaker 3 (04:11):
Yes, If the firemen are going to get injured, we
don't put them in danger. But we do flank the fire.
We don't just lay our hoses down and walk and
just watch. We're always trying to do something because the
fire can you know, the winds can shift, and if
we put a line in on the flank and the
wind shifts that way, that line that we're hoping is
going to hold. It doesn't always go in a straight manner.
(04:32):
You know, the wind, especially when you get the mountains,
kind of turn around and go the other way.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Yeah, when I see the aircraft going over and either
dumping retardant or water, it looks like it very little dealing.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
With a lot.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
How effective is that, especially when you're dealing with the
fire of this intensity.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Well, the large aircraft generally it doesn't drop in the
vicinity of the fire airman down below because they're flying
at such speeds that it doesn't break up. We can
get injured by the mass of the water. But the
helicopters we work closely with, and so when they give
me a drop, they can cool things down and I
can get in there and do a lot of work
in that area. And then they'll drop a little more
(05:18):
in front of me and a little more in front
of me and work along with me.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
All right.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
So it's not a question of extinguishing the fire, it's
a question of making it.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
It's just making it easier for you to fight the fire.
Do I have that right?
Speaker 3 (05:32):
Absolutely? Yes? Okay, you know we work hand in hand
with the helicopters. We have air attack crews that the
helicopters actually fly the guys to the fire, all right.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Chuck, Thank you always great perceptions and what you bring
to the table.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Say hi to Sally.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Build be safe. And by the way, I woke up
this morning and I can't see two hundred yards and
I'm in Las Vegas because of the smoke in California.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Boy, that tells you, all right, Chuck, thank you. You know.
One of the things that I find interesting about this
is you always think in terms of the retardant and
the water coming down to extinguish the fire, and it
has nothing to.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Do with that.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
It's cooling the area. So these guys can get to
work now.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Corbin Carson is at the airport fire Trabuco Canyon Fire.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Corbyin what's the latest. What are you seeing there?
Speaker 4 (06:27):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (06:27):
Yeah, last night, just finishing the briefing.
Speaker 6 (06:29):
Here, I'm at the incident command center and a lot
going on. Yesterday there was a briefing twelve people at
that command center. Today dozens here just because of how
that fire exploded yesterday.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
So again I'm being told.
Speaker 6 (06:41):
Last night there was some progress as temperatures dropped and
winds calmed down. Airs Cruse continued a night attack and
as hand engine and dozer crews worked to gain some ground.
The fire did lay down last night thanks to reduced
win and some temperatures. Today, air crews will continue to
hammer away and the temperatures and win are expected to
be lower. But a concerning fuel advisory has been issued
(07:03):
for the fuel moisture because of all that drive brush
that is collected in some areas, than some of those
areas having burned in decades, all that could kick back
up again. Fortunately, I'm being told the fire is currently
hung up by a burn scar from a fire in
twenty eighteen that was called the Holy Fire.
Speaker 5 (07:19):
I worked that.
Speaker 6 (07:20):
Fire, which was also started in Tribucal Candidate, and that
one did end up burning all the way through to
Lake Elsinore. And I spoke with OCFA Division Chief Craig
kof Craig Kovee, he was the guy that ran operations
last night to give me the latest on how it went.
Speaker 7 (07:33):
So, what was good about last night? Unlike the night
before the night before, it stayed ninety degrees and had
twenty nine hour wins. And this thing really really aggressively
burned last night. We had favorable weather conditions. It dropped
down to sixty degrees less wins. The fire really settled
down and held in place. So we went from a
defensive posture where we're trying to do point protection and
(07:55):
structured defense into an offensive mode and actually started going
after it and putting a containment line. So there was
a very successful operation last night, particularly in New York
Tega Highway area and Decker Canyons.
Speaker 6 (08:06):
And now the reason why he's bringing that up is
because before they got.
Speaker 5 (08:09):
A handle on that, what everyone.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
Was seeing yesterday was these big, I mean nuclear plume
looking things that happened up from multiple flyers and during
that area when it hopped or take a highway, there
were multiple homes damaged. And I just like minutes ago,
got the latest on the damages there. I spoke with
OCFA Fire Captain Steve Concialdi for.
Speaker 8 (08:30):
That it did jump or take a highway yesterday, and
we are aware that homes have been impacted. There's been
some homes that have been destroyed and damaged. We have
damage assessment teams and those homes are on the east
side of the fire, the Ortaga side of the fire,
(08:51):
where where homes were directly impacted and damaged and destroyed.
We have a damage assessment teams that will be going
there today and tom so we'll be getting that information
out as soon as we can.
Speaker 6 (09:03):
So again the big concern to figure out how many
of those homes and buildings were destroyed. We also are
getting reports over the last couple of days bill eight
firefighters injured and some homeowners are possibly civilians injured. At
least one woman a report that she was taken to
the burn to the burn unit.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
I just got a text from someone I know who
lives in the area said that she's feeling noticed that
it's drizzling in this general vicinity or that general vicinity.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Any news about that.
Speaker 6 (09:33):
Not yet, we haven't heard. There could be some weather
movement that we're hearing today. But again the big concern,
and hopefully that rain comes through because as you can imagine,
that would certainly help firefighters in there try to contain
this thing.
Speaker 5 (09:47):
There's zero percent containment right now.
Speaker 6 (09:49):
We're more than twenty two thousand acres burned as the
latest acreage in this fire that started Monday.
Speaker 5 (09:55):
And again, anything that can help them.
Speaker 6 (09:57):
The lower temperatures, the lower wind is expected to the
fuel moisture still being a problem, and again as it
approaches Lake Elsin or one of those main concerns is
that elsin Oor effect which happened at the Holy Fire.
That's where the wind just kind of pushes the fire
into the city through the canyons and then switches.
Speaker 5 (10:14):
Every day at the two PM.
Speaker 6 (10:16):
It's like the opposite of Santa Ana wins. And that's
what they're prepping for now, to try to make sure
that they can stay ahead ahead of that event.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
All right, thanks, Corbin will be there, I'm sure rest
of the day reporting. It's no fun when we have
our reporters sitting there, but at least I'm in an
air conditioned studio, so feel better for me.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Thanks there.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Nice talking to you, Corn.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
All right, hey, before we get to Jim Keeney, because
there's a lot of issues going on with the air
quality and what happens, quick announcement about what Neil and
Amy are doing, and that is raising money for the
Union Rescue Mission and this is one of the homeless
shelters that's out there, and iHeart is joining it and
(10:57):
with these two people are gonna do, crazily enough repel
five stories down from the roof of the Universal City
Hilton and trying to raise money and I can't wait
to see them repel down this building. Registration of course
is free, and if you raise one thousand dollars more,
you too can repel. And boy, I'm lining up for
that one. And so just go to just help one
(11:22):
dot org and you can donate.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
To help those homeless people.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And it's almost like a sissy Fucian attempt to deal
with this.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Neil, look that one up. You try.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
I know the story and the boulder, Oh I get it.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Cono do you know the story? Excellent? Okay, So I'll
be referring to Kno on that one.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Neil, you know, just say you don't know when I
want you not to know.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Please.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
You know, I'm just getting the wrong response from you,
from Steve Gregory, from everybody today, this is not helpful
at all.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Jim Keeney, Good morning, Jim, Good morning Mill.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yes you live in Orange County, Jim, and so you are,
from what I understand, if I remember correctly, you are
right near the Trabuca Tribuco fire.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
If I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Yeah, no, I.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
Got a good picture of it. Yes from the hill.
It's busy. It looks it looked like a nuclear blast,
you know, like a mushroom cloud. Yesterday is amazing yeah,
I mean horrible, horribly amazing.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Yeah, And here is the question I have because from
what I understand, and I was just told that this
isn't just the area where you happen to be living,
where you're breathing this stuff and this toxic smoke and
ash or whatever, but it affects all of southern California
when you have something of this size. So let's talk
(12:51):
about how prevalent, how extensive what you're looking at health wise.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
Yeah, I mean, etars are definitely an increase the worsertori illness. Now,
anyone you know, especially younger kids who have a predisposition
to asthma or croup or any of those type of things,
they end up in the emergency room because they're having
trouble breathing. I mean, I even I have mild asthma
and it only rarely pops up, and I had to
(13:20):
use them inhaler yesterday too. It's the air quality is bad.
You might you know, people's throats are scratchy, your eyes
are burning, and really all you can do to combat
that is stay indoors and air conditioning if that's available
to you. I mean, being outdoors in this poor air
quality is rough.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
A lot of schools will.
Speaker 4 (13:41):
Either cancel school altogether, or they'll cancel at least their
outdoor activities.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
Like you know, I haven't seen anybody walking around with masks,
you know, in those the COVID masks.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Do that would that help?
Speaker 4 (13:56):
You know, it would help somewhat because a lot of
this is really it's not like pollution, getting soul fights
and that type of studies, chemicals that the masks won't
filter out. This is actually particulate matter, and the masks
would help filter out some of that, especially if you're
nearby those fires.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Now, and let me ask if someone, and I don't
remember who told me that a few days of this
is equivalent to.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
X number of years or months of smoking? Is it that?
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Are we talking about something that's that blatantly dangerous even
a couple of few days and weeks of this?
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (14:34):
I mean, your lungs are blind ended sack, right, there's
no it's not like you're intestines, where it goes in
one side, it comes outside. So anything that goes into
your lungs pretty much states there the rest of your life.
So every carbon particle that you get into your lungs
will be there forever. So it does have significant health effects.
(14:55):
You know, it is important to try and avoid exposure
to really smoke environmental you know, I mean people, we
have extra capacity in our lungs. So for those people
who have belongs, it's not necessarily going to cause too
much trouble for them. But people who are kind of
teetering on the edge, this could knock them over the
edge and really cause significant long term health problems for them.
(15:18):
I was looking to see if any news articles were
out there but about people with lung problems from the smoke,
and I noticed that from the Hawaii they were talking
about how seventy five percent of the people who were
exposed to Hawaii fires and that was a while are
still experiencing some lung problems.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
Wow. So typically, all right, you have someone who's coming
into the er, what would you be looking at in
light of this fire?
Speaker 4 (15:48):
So, I mean they're typically coming in with spasming of
the luve so the air spasm to asthma is we
can reverse theasming by giving them breathing treatment and that
type of stuff. Sometimes it's so bad deroid's because inflammation
and the lungs are so bad. This is not like
when someone walks into like a house on fire or
(16:09):
something like that and they've inhaled hot soot, that's a
totally different animal where you know, now we have to
consider that they could go into respiratory failure. So firefighters
who are caught in a firestorm, that's a different type
of thing. This is more it's they're breathing irritants and
those irr tints are causing problems what they're breathing, and
we can reverse that extent I mean, and some people
(16:31):
will need to be hospitalized. They'll be bad enough that
can't make them better in one or two hours in
the er, and they'll need to stay overnight.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
All right, let's finish up talking about heat stroke because
of this insane heat and the droughts that we are having,
And just want to share a quick story. I remember
once I was underby I was doing something on the
way to someplace, so I got out of the airport
and all of a sudden, I was walking around hundred
(16:59):
and two degree heat. Of course, felt very very weak,
wasn't even thirsty, and it was My color was ashen.
And someone just handed me a bottle of water and
I just guzzled it down. And literally within twelve fifteen
minutes it turned around. I felt, Okay, I'm assuming I
was getting into some kind of heat stroke episode.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:23):
Absolutely, that's called heat exhaustion. That's kind of the stage
before heat stroke. And the reason we call it heat
is because that's when you've entered the level of you
have altered mental stata, and that's a really really serious condition.
People don't do well once they get that that off,
and the brain damage can be permanent when the heat
gets that high, So you want to try and avoid it.
(17:46):
And you experienced a lot of those symptoms. You can
get lighthead dizzy. You feel either just hot red hot,
and you're not sweating because you just run out of water,
or you may be sweating, but warning signs that lightheaded dizziness.
You need to take care of yourself. Get into shade,
get into someplace cooler if you can, get indoors and
(18:07):
then or in front of a fan, and also drink
a lot of water, cold fluids and metal help cool
you off.
Speaker 7 (18:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
I was pretty scary there for a moment, all right, Jim,
You know, thanks for that. We'll talk again next week
and you have a good one and hopefully you stay
out of the er.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
I don't know why I'm saying that, just to be
a nice guy.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
Did you buy any chance go skiing or snowboarding when
you're in Dubai?
Speaker 3 (18:31):
I did that.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Yeah, I went to No, I didn't, but I went
to that. I went to that mall where they do
have the indoor skiing and it was kind of neat.
That's that's what happens when you have more money than
you have brains and you Yeah, nothing like a ski
lodge or a ski location where it's one hundred and
(18:53):
thirty degrees outside.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
All right, Jim, always a pleasure, Take care. We'll talk
again next week.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Doctor Jim Keeney who And by the way, he does
tell me about deaths in the r He's been at
this for a whole lot of years almost I don't know,
twenty eight years. He's been doing the emergency medicine. And
those are the conversations we have. Anybody died this week,
Jim really describe that to me. And Jim actually puts
(19:23):
up with that stuff. All right, guys, we are done.
A quick word before we leave about the charity that
Amy and Neil are involved with the Union Rescue Mission
and iHeartMedia getting together to help the Union Rescue Mission
and they're going to repel off the Universal City Hilton
(19:44):
and you can help out a thousand bucks. You get
to repel too. He can raise one thousand dollars. So
just go to just helpone dot org and you get
all the information. That's it, guys, we're done, Amy. We're
going to say something.
Speaker 9 (19:58):
Amy, I was just going to say, if you want
to take a look at what Neil and I are
going to be going down, go check out our Instagram
at Amy k King and also at AM six forty
KFI KFI AM six forty. Sorry, we've got a little
video on there and there's a direct link to donate to.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
Okay, fair enough, we'll talk about more about that because
that's coming.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
Up September twenty seventh, September twenty seven. That's going to
be kind of fun, all right.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Amy comes back tomorrow morning at five am, as always
with wake up call. Neil and I join up from
six to nine and we always give Coono and some credit.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
This is KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the
iHeartRadio app. You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show
catch my show Monday through Friday six am to nine am,
and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app
You're listening to KFI AM six forty the bill Handle
Show on demand on the iheartradiop And this is KFI
AM six forty bill Handle here on a Wednesday morning,
September eleventh, nine eleven.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Twenty three years ago. Today.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Last night the debate, of course, which we're going to
be talking about, I'm sure for the rest of the
day and probably for the rest of the campaign, the
presidential campaign, and I talked about that this morning seven
and seven twenty for the first half hour of the show.
And then the other big story is the fires that
are happening in southern California.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
And we have Blake Trolley at the Bridge fire.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Michael Monk is going to report from the Line fire
in San Bernardino, Corbyn Carson at the Airport fire. And
one of the things that Blake talked about was how
the fire in the Angelus National Forests has increased by tenfold.
And I had asked him, you know, what do you
do when it's blowing that quickly?
Speaker 2 (01:02):
What a firefighters do? And I'm asking Chuck Lovers.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Chuck has been a friend of mine for twenty five
years and has worked for La County Fire.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
He've been on the front lines for all of those years.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Chuck, thanks for taking the time to just and a hello.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
We haven't talked in a while.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
Good morning, Bill. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Let me ask and this is one of the questions
I asked Blake, And of course he's not a firefighting expert.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Is there a point when a fire is going this quickly?
Speaker 1 (01:32):
Where and if it's going in the right direction you
just sit back and see where it's going to go,
or you always looking at fighting.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
We're going to stop it, We're going to move it
in that direction. How does that work?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Well, we can't stop the wind, and so we have
to kind of step aside for our own safety. If
it's going in a direction that is not going to
hurt people, that's okay. But if it's going in a
direction of a village or a school or something, we
will try to send troops out in way in advance
of the fire and try to mitigate any fire hazards
(02:07):
around those structures. So we'll do what we can, and
then once it hits, we will try to protect those structures.
The engine crews with the hoses and stuff will wet
things down as best they can. When the winds are blowing,
it's a little difficult. You know, the hose stream doesn't
go straight anymore, it binds. But we you know, we
(02:29):
do what we can with nature.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
What do you do?
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You know, when do you just give up the ghost
and saying it's moving too quickly, it's burning too hot.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
We're going to just let it.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
We are simply going to let it do its thing,
even with structures or you always fighting if structures are involved.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Well, we're always trying to do something. If structures are
involved and people are involved, we always try to do something.
And it's true, maybe we can't be right in the
middle of the mix, and maybe we're going to work
for on the fringes, but we never never say we
can't do anything. Now, if life and property are is
not a problem, then we will mostly just flank the
fire and catch it when the wind's side down or
(03:08):
when the when the sun goes down, and maybe get
some recovery at night. We do our best work at night.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
And when you hear zero percent contained, thirty percent contained,
what does that actually mean?
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Well, contain just means the line the guys that are
on the ground, what I was doing cutting a hand line,
that's containment. And you know you may start off, a
fire might be twenty percent contained in the early earliness
of the fire, and then the winds come up and
it blows up, and now that twenty percent is only
two percent because the fire has grown that much.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
And so when you're looking at these and this thing
is growing as quickly as as this one has. I mean,
I've never heard of a fire going ten times overnight.
I've heard of doubling, tripling. But when it explodes at
ten times, you reach a point where you just go,
this is beyond our control at this point, and it's
(04:02):
going to do what it's going to do. And let's
figure out what happens when we happen to be able
to do something. Does that make any sense, Chuck?
Speaker 3 (04:11):
Yes, If the firemen are going to get injured, we
don't put them in danger. But we do flank the fire.
We don't just lay our hoses down and walk and
just watch. We're always trying to do something because the
fire can you know, the winds can shift, and if
we put a line in on the flank and the
wind shifts that way, that line that we're hoping is
going to hold. It doesn't always go in a straight manner.
(04:32):
You know, the wind, especially when you get the mountains,
kind of turn around and go the other way.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Yeah, when I see the aircraft going over and either
dumping retardant or water, it looks like it very little dealing.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
With a lot.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
How effective is that, especially when you're dealing with the
fire of this intensity.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Well, the large aircraft generally it doesn't drop in the
vicinity of the fire airman down below because they're flying
at such speeds that it doesn't break up. We can
get injured by the mass of the water. But the
helicopters we work closely with, and so when they give
me a drop, they can cool things down and I
can get in there and do a lot of work
in that area. And then they'll drop a little more
(05:18):
in front of me and a little more in front
of me and work along with me.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
All right.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
So it's not a question of extinguishing the fire, it's
a question of making it.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
It's just making it easier for you to fight the fire.
Do I have that right?
Speaker 3 (05:32):
Absolutely? Yes? Okay, you know we work hand in hand
with the helicopters. We have air attack crews that the
helicopters actually fly the guys to the fire, all right.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Chuck, Thank you always great perceptions and what you bring
to the table.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Say hi to Sally.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Build be safe. And by the way, I woke up
this morning and I can't see two hundred yards and
I'm in Las Vegas because of the smoke in California.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Boy, that tells you, all right, Chuck, thank you. You know.
One of the things that I find interesting about this
is you always think in terms of the retardant and
the water coming down to extinguish the fire, and it
has nothing to.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Do with that.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
It's cooling the area. So these guys can get to
work now.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Corbin Carson is at the airport fire Trabuco Canyon Fire.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Corbyin what's the latest. What are you seeing there?
Speaker 4 (06:27):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (06:27):
Yeah, last night, just finishing the briefing.
Speaker 6 (06:29):
Here, I'm at the incident command center and a lot
going on. Yesterday there was a briefing twelve people at
that command center. Today dozens here just because of how
that fire exploded yesterday.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
So again I'm being told.
Speaker 6 (06:41):
Last night there was some progress as temperatures dropped and
winds calmed down. Airs Cruse continued a night attack and
as hand engine and dozer crews worked to gain some ground.
The fire did lay down last night thanks to reduced
win and some temperatures. Today, air crews will continue to
hammer away and the temperatures and win are expected to
be lower. But a concerning fuel advisory has been issued
(07:03):
for the fuel moisture because of all that drive brush
that is collected in some areas, than some of those
areas having burned in decades, all that could kick back
up again. Fortunately, I'm being told the fire is currently
hung up by a burn scar from a fire in
twenty eighteen that was called the Holy Fire.
Speaker 5 (07:19):
I worked that.
Speaker 6 (07:20):
Fire, which was also started in Tribucal Candidate, and that
one did end up burning all the way through to
Lake Elsinore. And I spoke with OCFA Division Chief Craig
kof Craig Kovee, he was the guy that ran operations
last night to give me the latest on how it went.
Speaker 7 (07:33):
So, what was good about last night? Unlike the night
before the night before, it stayed ninety degrees and had
twenty nine hour wins. And this thing really really aggressively
burned last night. We had favorable weather conditions. It dropped
down to sixty degrees less wins. The fire really settled
down and held in place. So we went from a
defensive posture where we're trying to do point protection and
(07:55):
structured defense into an offensive mode and actually started going
after it and putting a containment line. So there was
a very successful operation last night, particularly in New York
Tega Highway area and Decker Canyons.
Speaker 6 (08:06):
And now the reason why he's bringing that up is
because before they got.
Speaker 5 (08:09):
A handle on that, what everyone.
Speaker 6 (08:12):
Was seeing yesterday was these big, I mean nuclear plume
looking things that happened up from multiple flyers and during
that area when it hopped or take a highway, there
were multiple homes damaged. And I just like minutes ago,
got the latest on the damages there. I spoke with
OCFA Fire Captain Steve Concialdi for.
Speaker 8 (08:30):
That it did jump or take a highway yesterday, and
we are aware that homes have been impacted. There's been
some homes that have been destroyed and damaged. We have
damage assessment teams and those homes are on the east
side of the fire, the Ortaga side of the fire,
(08:51):
where where homes were directly impacted and damaged and destroyed.
We have a damage assessment teams that will be going
there today and tom so we'll be getting that information
out as soon as we can.
Speaker 6 (09:03):
So again the big concern to figure out how many
of those homes and buildings were destroyed. We also are
getting reports over the last couple of days bill eight
firefighters injured and some homeowners are possibly civilians injured. At
least one woman a report that she was taken to
the burn to the burn unit.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
I just got a text from someone I know who
lives in the area said that she's feeling noticed that
it's drizzling in this general vicinity or that general vicinity.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Any news about that.
Speaker 6 (09:33):
Not yet, we haven't heard. There could be some weather
movement that we're hearing today. But again the big concern,
and hopefully that rain comes through because as you can imagine,
that would certainly help firefighters in there try to contain
this thing.
Speaker 5 (09:47):
There's zero percent containment right now.
Speaker 6 (09:49):
We're more than twenty two thousand acres burned as the
latest acreage in this fire that started Monday.
Speaker 5 (09:55):
And again, anything that can help them.
Speaker 6 (09:57):
The lower temperatures, the lower wind is expected to the
fuel moisture still being a problem, and again as it
approaches Lake Elsin or one of those main concerns is
that elsin Oor effect which happened at the Holy Fire.
That's where the wind just kind of pushes the fire
into the city through the canyons and then switches.
Speaker 5 (10:14):
Every day at the two PM.
Speaker 6 (10:16):
It's like the opposite of Santa Ana wins. And that's
what they're prepping for now, to try to make sure
that they can stay ahead ahead of that event.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
All right, thanks, Corbin will be there, I'm sure rest
of the day reporting. It's no fun when we have
our reporters sitting there, but at least I'm in an
air conditioned studio, so feel better for me.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Thanks there.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Nice talking to you, Corn.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
All right, hey, before we get to Jim Keeney, because
there's a lot of issues going on with the air
quality and what happens, quick announcement about what Neil and
Amy are doing, and that is raising money for the
Union Rescue Mission and this is one of the homeless
shelters that's out there, and iHeart is joining it and
(10:57):
with these two people are gonna do, crazily enough repel
five stories down from the roof of the Universal City
Hilton and trying to raise money and I can't wait
to see them repel down this building. Registration of course
is free, and if you raise one thousand dollars more,
you too can repel. And boy, I'm lining up for
that one. And so just go to just help one
(11:22):
dot org and you can donate.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
To help those homeless people.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And it's almost like a sissy Fucian attempt to deal
with this.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Neil, look that one up. You try.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
I know the story and the boulder, Oh I get it.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Cono do you know the story? Excellent? Okay, So I'll
be referring to Kno on that one.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Neil, you know, just say you don't know when I
want you not to know.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Please.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
You know, I'm just getting the wrong response from you,
from Steve Gregory, from everybody today, this is not helpful
at all.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
Jim Keeney, Good morning, Jim, Good morning Mill.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Yes you live in Orange County, Jim, and so you are,
from what I understand, if I remember correctly, you are
right near the Trabuca Tribuco fire.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
If I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Yeah, no, I.
Speaker 4 (12:16):
Got a good picture of it. Yes from the hill.
It's busy. It looks it looked like a nuclear blast,
you know, like a mushroom cloud. Yesterday is amazing yeah,
I mean horrible, horribly amazing.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Yeah, And here is the question I have because from
what I understand, and I was just told that this
isn't just the area where you happen to be living,
where you're breathing this stuff and this toxic smoke and
ash or whatever, but it affects all of southern California
when you have something of this size. So let's talk
(12:51):
about how prevalent, how extensive what you're looking at health wise.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
Yeah, I mean, etars are definitely an increase the worsertori illness. Now,
anyone you know, especially younger kids who have a predisposition
to asthma or croup or any of those type of things,
they end up in the emergency room because they're having
trouble breathing. I mean, I even I have mild asthma
and it only rarely pops up, and I had to
(13:20):
use them inhaler yesterday too. It's the air quality is bad.
You might you know, people's throats are scratchy, your eyes
are burning, and really all you can do to combat
that is stay indoors and air conditioning if that's available
to you. I mean, being outdoors in this poor air
quality is rough.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
A lot of schools will.
Speaker 4 (13:41):
Either cancel school altogether, or they'll cancel at least their
outdoor activities.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
Like you know, I haven't seen anybody walking around with masks,
you know, in those the COVID masks.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Do that would that help?
Speaker 4 (13:56):
You know, it would help somewhat because a lot of
this is really it's not like pollution, getting soul fights
and that type of studies, chemicals that the masks won't
filter out. This is actually particulate matter, and the masks
would help filter out some of that, especially if you're
nearby those fires.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Now, and let me ask if someone, and I don't
remember who told me that a few days of this
is equivalent to.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
X number of years or months of smoking? Is it that?
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Are we talking about something that's that blatantly dangerous even
a couple of few days and weeks of this?
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (14:34):
I mean, your lungs are blind ended sack, right, there's
no it's not like you're intestines, where it goes in
one side, it comes outside. So anything that goes into
your lungs pretty much states there the rest of your life.
So every carbon particle that you get into your lungs
will be there forever. So it does have significant health effects.
(14:55):
You know, it is important to try and avoid exposure
to really smoke environmental you know, I mean people, we
have extra capacity in our lungs. So for those people
who have belongs, it's not necessarily going to cause too
much trouble for them. But people who are kind of
teetering on the edge, this could knock them over the
edge and really cause significant long term health problems for them.
(15:18):
I was looking to see if any news articles were
out there but about people with lung problems from the smoke,
and I noticed that from the Hawaii they were talking
about how seventy five percent of the people who were
exposed to Hawaii fires and that was a while are
still experiencing some lung problems.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
Wow. So typically, all right, you have someone who's coming
into the er, what would you be looking at in
light of this fire?
Speaker 4 (15:48):
So, I mean they're typically coming in with spasming of
the luve so the air spasm to asthma is we
can reverse theasming by giving them breathing treatment and that
type of stuff. Sometimes it's so bad deroid's because inflammation
and the lungs are so bad. This is not like
when someone walks into like a house on fire or
(16:09):
something like that and they've inhaled hot soot, that's a
totally different animal where you know, now we have to
consider that they could go into respiratory failure. So firefighters
who are caught in a firestorm, that's a different type
of thing. This is more it's they're breathing irritants and
those irr tints are causing problems what they're breathing, and
we can reverse that extent I mean, and some people
(16:31):
will need to be hospitalized. They'll be bad enough that
can't make them better in one or two hours in
the er, and they'll need to stay overnight.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
All right, let's finish up talking about heat stroke because
of this insane heat and the droughts that we are having,
And just want to share a quick story. I remember
once I was underby I was doing something on the
way to someplace, so I got out of the airport
and all of a sudden, I was walking around hundred
(16:59):
and two degree heat. Of course, felt very very weak,
wasn't even thirsty, and it was My color was ashen.
And someone just handed me a bottle of water and
I just guzzled it down. And literally within twelve fifteen
minutes it turned around. I felt, Okay, I'm assuming I
was getting into some kind of heat stroke episode.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:23):
Absolutely, that's called heat exhaustion. That's kind of the stage
before heat stroke. And the reason we call it heat
is because that's when you've entered the level of you
have altered mental stata, and that's a really really serious condition.
People don't do well once they get that that off,
and the brain damage can be permanent when the heat
gets that high, So you want to try and avoid it.
(17:46):
And you experienced a lot of those symptoms. You can
get lighthead dizzy. You feel either just hot red hot,
and you're not sweating because you just run out of water,
or you may be sweating, but warning signs that lightheaded dizziness.
You need to take care of yourself. Get into shade,
get into someplace cooler if you can, get indoors and
(18:07):
then or in front of a fan, and also drink
a lot of water, cold fluids and metal help cool
you off.
Speaker 7 (18:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
I was pretty scary there for a moment, all right, Jim,
You know, thanks for that. We'll talk again next week
and you have a good one and hopefully you stay
out of the er.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
I don't know why I'm saying that, just to be
a nice guy.
Speaker 4 (18:28):
Did you buy any chance go skiing or snowboarding when
you're in Dubai?
Speaker 3 (18:31):
I did that.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Yeah, I went to No, I didn't, but I went
to that. I went to that mall where they do
have the indoor skiing and it was kind of neat.
That's that's what happens when you have more money than
you have brains and you Yeah, nothing like a ski
lodge or a ski location where it's one hundred and
(18:53):
thirty degrees outside.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
All right, Jim, always a pleasure, Take care. We'll talk
again next week.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Doctor Jim Keeney who And by the way, he does
tell me about deaths in the r He's been at
this for a whole lot of years almost I don't know,
twenty eight years. He's been doing the emergency medicine. And
those are the conversations we have. Anybody died this week,
Jim really describe that to me. And Jim actually puts
(19:23):
up with that stuff. All right, guys, we are done.
A quick word before we leave about the charity that
Amy and Neil are involved with the Union Rescue Mission
and iHeartMedia getting together to help the Union Rescue Mission
and they're going to repel off the Universal City Hilton
(19:44):
and you can help out a thousand bucks. You get
to repel too. He can raise one thousand dollars. So
just go to just helpone dot org and you get
all the information. That's it, guys, we're done, Amy. We're
going to say something.
Speaker 9 (19:58):
Amy, I was just going to say, if you want
to take a look at what Neil and I are
going to be going down, go check out our Instagram
at Amy k King and also at AM six forty
KFI KFI AM six forty. Sorry, we've got a little
video on there and there's a direct link to donate to.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
Okay, fair enough, we'll talk about more about that because
that's coming.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
Up September twenty seventh, September twenty seven. That's going to
be kind of fun, all right.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Amy comes back tomorrow morning at five am, as always
with wake up call. Neil and I join up from
six to nine and we always give Coono and some credit.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
This is KFI AM six forty live everywhere on the
iHeartRadio app. You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show
catch my show Monday through Friday six am to nine am,
and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app
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