This weekend a fire stated in the woods in the Lake country area near the settlement of Cobb. As you probably know my old company has been in the radio communications business since the early 70's and as one of our services we provided mountain top repeater service.
No more on Cobb Mtn. elevation 4800 feet overlooking Lake, Mendocino, Sonoma, Napa and Marin counties.
I was told that the site when "off the air" at 6am on Sunday. So far, there have been over 500 homes lost, and in square miles, we are talking the area of both San Francisco and Oakland included.
People described it as a blow torch, that spread extremely fast because of the dry conditions that is being blamed on the drought for one.
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| Cobb Mtn tower 140ft |
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| side away from the fire |
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| side exposed to the fire |
The building actually was a insulated shipping container, with steel walls, one photo you will see has three open holes. That is the side that was away from the fire. The next photo is the what was left inside the building from the other open side. You can see the corresponding holes in the sides.
I am amazed at the amount of destruction. I figured there would be some recognizable items. The only thing that I still recognize is in a corner of the building, They were 10 inch round steel cylinders that are used as frequency filters.
All totals, One FM radio station, Two Internet providers, and lots of two way radio repeaters where lost.
I was told that it is going to be awhile before they let the residents back down into the valley. The fire by the way is called the "Valley Fire" and is only about 5 % controlled as I write this.
They are hoping for some rain on Wednesday to slow it down a little. The town of Middletown was about 7 miles away that is is 80% gone.
Kind of makes me want to get rid of half the trees on the ranch here.
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