A Local brush fire is now under control, but not before the smoke nearly blotted out the sun. Fine, white ashes continue to fall here, even after sunset. This is how the sun looked mid-afternoon from the back yard. Click to enlarge.
SoCal Edison blamed the fire on a bird. From the Daily Breeze:
Firefighters mopped up the remnants of a 10-acre brush fire this afternoon that briefly threatened the Rancho Palos Verdes City Hall earlier in the day.
Unlike fires raging elsewhere in Southern California, the one on the Palos Verdes Peninsula was put out quickly. It took about 100 firefighters and two helicopters about an hour to extinguish it, authorities said.
The fire was reported at 11:02 a.m. It burned in a canyon near Hawthorne Boulevard and Palos Verdes Drive South.
“It started to go to the city yard,” said Los Angeles County Fire Capt. Jeff Vroomes. “That was our priority. We made an aggressive attempt to get in front of it.”
No homes were immediately threatened.
Southern California Edison officials determined the fire was caused by a bird that landed on power lines. After being killed by electricity and catching fire, the animal fell into the dry brush, Vroomes said.
Birds perch on power lines all the time. I had to move my car where I parked because of that or else I would be washing it every day (my wife has to wash hers now). I have never seen a bird burst into flames from sitting on a power line. So I looked it up.
From http://www.fws.gov/birds/documents/powerlines.pdf
Why aren’t birds electrocuted when they sit on power lines?
“Actually, some birds are. Small birds don’t usually get electrocuted because they fail to complete a circuit either by touching a grounded wire or structure, or another energized wire, so electricity stays in the line. Larger birds, however- such as the California Condor, which has a wingspan of up to 9.5 feet – are more likely to touch a power line and a ground wire, another energized wire, or a pole at the same time,giving electricity a path to the ground.”
That’s interesting – we see a lot of large birds down that way including falcons, red tailed hawks and a lot of crows and ravens. I hope it wasn’t one of the hawks or falcons – they are fewer in numbers than the crows and ravens.
A very good description, although it leads readers to assume primarily large birds. Although large birds are “more likely” to be electrocuted, any size bird (or other object; mylar ballon, rats, person, etc) that makes a path betwen the high voltage line and a grounded object, will burst into flames. Sometimes, more than one bird is involved in the “chain” of energized line, to grounded object.