By David Rogers. BLOWING ROCK, N.C. — It was only four years ago that I dined with a longtime friend at an upscale restaurant in Pacific Palisades, Calif., where my friend lived. Never in my wildest nightmares could I have imagined a future in which this pristine, picturesque community would be ravaged by wildfire, everything consumed, leaving behind chimneys as lonely statues of a once great civilization and burned out shells that were once automobiles, now littering the charred streets.
How do we explain the unexpected, things that you would never imagine happening… happening?
We have experienced high winds and heavy rainfall from hurricanes in past years, but did any of us ever imagine the impact of Hurricane Helene on Asheville, Avery County, Chimney Rock, Lake Lure, much of Watauga County and so many other communities in the mountains of North Carolina and eastern Tennessee?
As someone who grew up in Southern California and still have many friends there, it tears at my heart strings to see the devastation in Pacific Palisades, Altadena, Malibu, and other areas around Los Angeles today. I’ve walked those streets, driven by the landmarks, talked with the people. The wildfires do not discriminate between the economic “classes.”
Before former President Ronald Reagan purchased Rancho Del Cielo north of Santa Barbara and it became his “Western White House,” he and Nancy had a vacation home in the Pacific Palisades area. For decades, the town has been one of the world’s priciest real estate markets, home to musicians, actors, and other celebrities, including highly successful business executives like my friend.
In this wildfire, it did not matter who you are or how much money you might have. My friend was able to evacuate with only four shirts, a laptop, his camera and a dog. He and his wife have relocated to a Comfort Inn, uncertain as to how long or what’s next.
Hurricane Helene and the wildfires of Los Angeles are not the only natural disasters in the past year, but they are among the most unimaginable. As a nation, we have also seen flooding in the Upper Midwest, six tornado outbreaks, a total of five tropical cyclones (hurricanes) and other severe weather events that brought hailstorms, snow and ice. There was an earlier wildfire in New Mexico last year and a heat wave-driven drought across the southern midsection of the U.S.
Certainly, those events rendered local areas “disaster zones,” and our thoughts and prayers go out to those suffering. We are thankful for non-profit organizations like Samaritan’s Purse and The Red Cross, as well as state and local government agencies such as FEMA and the SBA to help alleviate the suffering and speed up recovery.
Our own worst enemy?
Whether caused by climate change or some sort of “normal” weather cycle, these natural disaster events are becoming more severe and more frequent, it seems.
For Blowing Rock, which fared pretty well in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene compared to others in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, I am left to wonder if this wasn’t Mother Nature’s warning shot across our proverbial bow, begging us to question, “Are we prepared for the worst, perhaps yet to come? Are we ready for the unexpected? Can we imagine the unimaginable?”
Dr. Stephen Pyne, PhD, is an emeritus professor at Arizona State University, specializing in environmental history and especially the history of fire, according to his biography on the university website. For an interesting introduction to his perspective, I recommend his TED Talk:
Professionally, Pyne’s focus, in his own words published in Scientific American (April 16, 2024, “Fire Forged Humanity. Now It Threatens Everything”), “… has been to chronicle the relationship between fire and humans, an alliance that has remade — and unhinged — the planet.”
Humans became unique fire creatures. We used fire to remake ourselves, and then we and fire remade Earth.
Pyne’s ominous conclusion is methodically drawn.
“Life created the oxygen fire needs; life created and arranges the fuel it requires. Even the chemistry of fire is a biochemistry: fire takes apart what photosynthesis puts together. As long as terrestrial life has existed, so has fire,” he writes.
Pyne continues, “Fire takes on some properties of the living world it depends on. In ways, it resembles a virus — something not truly alive but that requires the living world to propagate. And like a virus, fire propagates by contagion.
“The one requirement of fire that life did not furnish was ignition,” he adds. “That changed with the appearance of a genus, now a single species, that could start fire at will: ours. Humans became unique fire creatures. We used fire to remake ourselves, and then we and fire remade Earth.”
For a fire to start, oxygen, fuel and heat must be present. The heat source must reach a hot enough temperature to cause ignition, and with ample fuel and oxygen in the surrounding area, a fire can spread with dramatic speed.
How is this relevant to us, today?
Several years ago, Blowing Rock Fire & Rescue Chief Kent Graham told me that the ice and wind events in and around our area create alarming threats to Blowing Rock and its surrounding communities’ well-being because of all the fallen trees and limbs in the forests. They create what emergency service folks refer to as “slash,” a highly flammable fuel source for wildfires due to the large quantity of readily combustible material, often forming dense piles that can easily catch fire and spread rapidly.
Slash is also created by logging operations. We haven’t seen as much logging activity in recent years, but there are still at least 33 companies based in the region registered with the North Carolina Forest Service with an interest in buying standing timber in Watauga and nearby counties.
The greatest danger from slash comes during periods of drought, when the slash on the ground has become dry and the otherwise live trees have less in the way of natural moisture content. During droughts, not only slash but the living trees themselves are potential fuel for a wildfire.
We have experienced periods where rainfall is scarce. The National Park Service and Blue Ridge Parkway literature report that this region’s “dry season” is in the fall, from September through November. I can think of a few wildfires that have occurred, such as in 2012 and 2021 that threatened Blue Ridge Mountain Club and another fire in 2017, closer to Linville Gorge.
Imagine the unimaginable. Our region is jampacked with lots of “extra” human activity in the autumn months, from campers to leaf peepers to seasonal residents, along with the full timers.
What happens if we have an unusually dry season in the fall and a hiker down the mountain, say in the Globe, carelessly throws a still-lit cigarette butt into the underbrush? Or a camper leaves a fire unattended and a sudden gust of wind casts aloft a burning ember? Someone prematurely discards ashes from a recently burning fireplace? A lightning strike? Ignition can come from several directions.
If conditions are just right… There is already plenty of oxygen and fuel, so if that fuel is particularly dry with little or no rainfall and something ignites it, fire can spread rapidly, uncontrollably. Fire generally moves upward and creates its own air movement. In Southern California, the prolonged wind gusts reached over 100 miles per hour in Pacific Palisades, according to news reports. Given those “just right” conditions, how quickly would it take a fire ignited in the Globe to sweep up the hillsides, and overcome Blowing Rock?
Without having recently witnessed what happened in Southern California, it might be hard to imagine something like that in this area. But we have more than ample vegetation, including slash to provide the fuel. Like Pacific Palisades, Malibu and Altadena, we have homes and businesses, too.
We also have a fire history, even if somewhat ancient. Memorial Park is where the Watauga Hotel, and later the Watauga Inn, was destroyed by fire — three times.
From the Blowing Rock Fire Department website comes this excerpt about the origins of the department:
In the fall of 1923 Blowing Rock citizens decided they needed to do something when a fire almost destroyed the community. The fire that started late one evening, swept through the tiny village destroying building after building. With no fire department in 1923, the citizens carried water in buckets from nearby wells to douse the fire and prevent it from spreading. Little could be done to control the fire and an entire section of town was gone in a matter of hours. Without a doubt, the fire was the most disastrous event in the city’s history. A new ordinance banning wood construction on Main Street was immediately put into place. Only weeks after the fire, the organization of the Blowing Rock Volunteer Fire Department began.
An excerpt from the Watauga Democrat is also included in the Fire Department website about this event.
BUSINESS SECTION OF BLOWING ROCK ALMOST COMPLETELY DESTROYED
Five Business Buildings Destroyed in Blaze Originating in Lentz Store at 12 oclock Last Night Post Office Among the Buildings Burned
According to advices reaching Boone late this morning, a large part of the business houses of the town of Blowing Rock are in ashes, as a result of a fire thought to have originated about 12 o’clock last night.
The Lentz Store, a large general mercantile establishment which was totally destroyed including all the contents is said to have been covered by insurance. The H.C. Hayes store building was destroyed, but practically all of the stock recovered. Young’s Café an entire loss, as was the Episcopal reading room and exchange building. Some of the current records were recovered from the Postoffice, which is otherwise a complete loss.
The loss has been estimated at from $50,000 to $100,000. With the exception of H.C. Hayes and Co., and the Martin Drug Store, no insurance is believe to have been in force.
The city of Blowing Rock may be expected to rise from the ashes phoenix-like with a short while, as plans for building operations are under way today, and it may be expected that the new business section will be bigger and better than ever before.
– Excerpt from Watauga Democrat
Sure, that was 1923, more than 100 years ago. Back then, probably no one imagined that the whole town’s business district could be destroyed by a single fire.
That was also before climate change, global warming or whatever weather cycle we are currently experiencing.
As a community, are we ready? What precautions can we take now to help minimize potential disaster?
Or is it folly to imagine the unimaginable?
