Leon Turnbull Photography

It is October now. Just when you thought fire season was over … all of a sudden California is facing disaster. Multiple fires raging in the state. Awful devastation in multiple counties. Caused by high wind? Certainly it is the wind and dry conditions that have stoked up the fire, but wind does not create fire, so what did? It was actually quite surprising when I woke up and learned so many fires were all of a sudden raging in the state. These must all be human caused fires (not necessarily intentionally, but definitely human caused). Don’t you think so? It is certainly not caused by climate change as some would have you believe (whose initials are HC). By this time last year we had over 10 inches of rain in the northern Sierra foothills. This year, essentially nada, and with the hot dry summer we had it does not help with the fire situation. Last year was an anomaly. We do not normally get very much rain in October. IT IS NORMAL TO NOT GET RAIN IN OCTOBER. Perhaps we usually do get a slight bit more than this year, but not much more. I think this summer is an anomaly, like last winter was an anomaly. However, we sure do need the winter to get started, especially now with all those fires. It looks like we have a weak La Nina this year again, precisely the same as what we had last year. So that should mean we will get another big winter, right? I wish. Unfortunately, there are many other factors and some of those other factors are different this year, so it certainly does not mean we will have a similar winter. I am just hoping and praying we will at least have an average winter, and we do not get sent back into a drought. Please God, no more drought (for a few years, at least).