This is the second post of the SoCal Steemit Fire Report. The main goal is to provide information about the numerous fires during fire season. Additionally, our mission is to report any natural disasters and provide a hub for supporting any steemian displaced by a natural disaster in Southern California

Intro: They say do something you are good at, well Sothern California is good at catching on fire. So we at @socalsteemit would like to provide a centralized hub of the information on fires and natural disasters located in SoCal. Please refer to our First Fire Report for any incident prior to this timeline.

Heat

July has seen record breaking heat all across Southern California. The Washington Post came out with a nice article titled All-time high temperature records set throughout Southern California, including Los Angeles that shows all the records broken recently.

In addition to UCLA, other locations that set all-time records in Southern California include:
Hollywood Burbank Airport, 114 degrees.
Van Nuys Airport, 117 degrees.
Ramona, 117 degrees.
Santa Ana, 114 degrees.
Riverside, 118 degrees (tying record from 1925).

The excessively hot conditions combined with very low humidity and gusty winds would allow any brush fires ignited to spread rapidly. Most of Southwest California is under a red flag warning, the alert for dangerous fire weather.

Temperatures soared up over the triple and the heat lingered into the night.

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Fires

A fire was reported off highway 8 in San Diego and grew . This fire became known as the West fire and NBC San Diego reports:

Thirty-four homes were destroyed when a devastating vegetation fire tore through the foothill community of Alpine in San Diego's East County on Friday.
The latest numbers released by Cal Fire Sunday said 20 other structures were damaged and 21 accessory buildings and a commercial building were also destroyed by the 505-acre West Fire that sparked at about 11:30 a.m. Friday near Willows Road and Alpine Boulevard.

This fire has been extinguished and residents are making their way back to their homes.

There also was a brush fire off the 210 freeway in Irvine that had traffic at a slow down due to smoke. ABC 7 has an article on the matter:

The blaze, dubbed the Arrow Fire, was initially said to be more than 5 acres in the area of the 15500 block of E Arrow Highway. The estimated size was later increased to 35 acres with 50 percent containment, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department.
Firefighters made water drops on the second-alarm blaze from the air, as other fire crews fought the flames from the ground.

This fire has been extinguished.

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Up North In Santa Barbara county The Holiday Fire ripped through the hills. The VC Star explains in their article:

The blaze burned 113 acres, destroyed 10 homes and 14 additional structures and damaged three others, according to the Santa Barbara County Fire Department. The fire was fully contained Tuesday night.
Firefighters and other emergency responders from across the state, including crews from Ventura County who were sent less than an hour after the fire was first reported, battled the Holiday Fire, which cost an estimated $1.5 million.

Shortly after the Holiday Fire had been extinguished, another small fire was reported in Santa Barbara due to brush clearing operations.

With the high heat brings monsoonal moisture and risks of lighting strikes in the mountians as well as flash flooding. Lighting struck a house in Banning California causing it to catch fire.

The Valley Fire in Forest Falls has yet to be contained and The Redlands Daily Facts tells of the problems:

U.S. Forest Service fire officials said containment on the blaze had reached 29 percent without it consuming any additional acreage, according to a news release. The has fire consumed 1,348 acres of vegetation — the same number of acres reported since Monday.
Containment, a term for getting a fire break or line around the fire, was announced at 24 percent on Wednesday and 13 percent on Tuesday. Factors like rough terrain and weather have made the firefight a tough go.

Flooding and Mudslides

The weather referred to in the case of the Valley Fire was the mudslides that occurred off highway 38. The Redlands Daily Facts gives insight into the flooding:

Dozens of cars were stranded for hours in floodwaters and mud Thursday afternoon, prompting authorities to shut down Highway 38 near Valley of the Falls Drive in the Forest Falls and Highway 18 on the backside of Big Bear in Lucerne Valley, California Highway Patrol officials said.
Flood waters had subsided as of 2:30 p.m., and Caltrans crews worked to clear the roadway, according to CHP and San Bernardino County fire officials. By 4:45 p.m., the closed section of Highway 18 was reopened, according to the CHP.

Not only is it flooding in the deserts but near the coast. King Tides have brought higher than usual tides and have breached a seawall in Orange County. The OC Register explains:

This week’s king tides caused water to breach a seawall on Balboa Peninsula, flooding the streets late Wednesday. Swell with sizable surf and onshore winds in the region likely helped contribute to the flooding.
The National Weather Service issued a flood advisory through 11 p.m. Saturday, warning of minor coastal flooding that could happen during the high tide in low-lying areas like Sunset and Seal Beach, Newport and Oceanside.

With all the crazy weather going on out there @socalsteemit wanted to leave you all with this video taken this week of a Firenado on the Colorado River near Blythe California. It really is incredible. Thank you for reading the report and be safe out there!

#SoCalSteemit is building and supporting the Steemit community of Southern California. If you are from SoCal and are into creating quality content here on Steemit, we'd love for you to follow us @SoCalSteemit and join our group on Discord

Socal Steemit Fire Report - July 6th-16th 2018

Heat

Fires

Flooding and Mudslides