Data backups?
generations of scientific data and hardware could be lost.
I realise that a lot of old JPL data is held on old media, but hopefully some of the important data is in secure, off-site storage in fire-safes.
With several major wildfires raging out of control in Los Angeles County, fire crews are risking their lives to protect people, homes, and a key NASA facility. At the time of the writing, about 70,000 people were told to evacuate their homes as the fires erupted after a dry winter, and hurricane-force winds howling across …
They may have some data in old formats they can no longer easily read, and don't have the funding to re-create the technology to read it to make those backups / convert it to a modern format. That data is probably not too useful other than from a historical perspective. I would hope everything of scientific value is in a modern format so it is easily replicated and backed up.
The "equipment" would be a bigger concern. If something like the twin of Voyager was lost they wouldn't have a way to test software patches on Earth before sending them on the light day's journey to the craft.
> I would hope everything of scientific value is in a modern format so it is easily replicated and backed up.
**LOL** Oh you sweet, sweet summer child.
Search for the "Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project" (AKA "McMoon" because it was run in an ex-McDonald's near JPL HQ)
This was a semi-crowdfunded effort to get the Lunar Orbiter data off obsolete tapes. They had to find obsolete AMPEX tape drives to read them and the retired technicians to repair and align those. The cameras were CIA equipment (classified at the time) and the images they recovered were stunning and far better than expected. The printouts had been done in the mid '60s on garbage-level black & white printers so no one realized the original data was such high resolution.
I hear the '76 Viking Mars lander data is now in similar condition.
Edit: I have an original 1967 print out of an LO image because I donated a bit of money. It's a prized possession.
I don't suppose anyone was smart enough to put in isolation valves in the fresh water distribution system to allow a fire pumper truck or two to take suction on the ocean and boost the water pressure to the evacted areas. No, can't do that because some Lawyer, Beancounter, or Politician couldn't see the ROI for this most basic configuration.
Californias governor just made natural gas anything illegal, yet these wildfires seem to be their major polluter that the local/state government don't seem to deal with. And don't try to cashout and leave the state without paying your exit tax.
Now, let me guess where the fires started, hmmmmm? I bet it was in a high voltage power line corridore supposidly maintained by their superior PG&E power company that can make big dividend payments to shareholders and lay off lineworkers, but maintenance? forget it, not going to happen!
Can't wait until the San Andreas Fault breaks off the whole southern end of Californiacation and it slides into the ocean, I'm pretty sure that will put out the fires!
Ler the Downvotes begin, I like a good laugh.....................!
Your ignorance about the water system is astounding. It's a fresh water system, nay, a potable water system that supplies both drinking water and water for fire fighting. The system is a looped system around multiple neighborhoods to try and keep pressure up along with pump stations and reservoirs. Salt water would literally corrode the system if it was used, and would require an entire flush of the system after use to bring it back to potable water use. Keep your simple solutions to complex problems out of my area of competency. I'm a civil engineer that works in the Los Angeles metropolitan area with over 30 years of experience with these systems and understand how they work. You deserve every downvote you get from your ignorance.
And I was a water King on a Man of War, the USS Midway.
When the shit hits the fan and you need water for fire fighting, guess what, you use all systems that were properly designed for multiple functionality.
You people got caught with your pants down around your ankles and now your going to pay the price big time because everything you do is half assed and not fit for purpose.
Why worry about a potable water system when the end effect of the destruction is that there isn't a fucking house left standing for miles around because you ran out of drinking water. Your pumps can't keep up and you can't fire fight.
To cheap, to lazy, to stupid, to blind to build a distribution that system that will serve the purpose in times of extreme need. No forward thinking, no consideration of failsafe scenarios that might just come up and bite you in the ass like today.
How many years has that shit hole area caught on fire and burned the fuck out of everything,
Nobody gives a damn about the crap feast that LA IS TODAY.
And guess what, when your finished using your pristine water system as need by pumping sea water into it for fire fighting you flush it and super clorinate it with calcium hypochlorite. But you won't have to because there won't be a building for miles around because they burned down to the ground due to the lack of water for fire fighting.
By the way my man, I have two engineering degrees myself, one mechanical and one electrical. Plus 45 years as a Millwright (and Union at that), so go cry yourself a river because Californication is and always has been a losing Shit Hole.
Sympathy, you'll find it in the dictionary someplace between shit and syphilis.
Have a nice day and don't forget to flush twice because it's a long way home when your street address doesn't exist any more!
You don't pull 25 miles, you pump 25 miles. But the system would have required fore thought before hand to be ready for events like today. How many times has this crap hole been burning every year.
LA has been pumping water from 250 miles from the north that they been stealing since the 1920's. Don't tell me they couldn't pump it from 25 miles away if they were so inclined to do so.
No planning in place and now they don't have to worry about it now do they?
You reveal your ignorance and stupidity every time you try to make a point!
1. Altadena is about 1,400 ft above sea level.
2. The Los Angeles Aqueduct (which is what you mean) doesn't pump anything. It uses gravity. Entirely. And generates power, too.
3. Water flows from the central valley over the Sierra Nevada mountains, breaking off to feed the foothills (Pasadena, Altadena, Glendale, La Canada/Flintridge, etc) before heading down to LA proper and the ocean. Your dumb-as-shit idea has pumps to pull water out of the Pacific, push it 25 miles and 1,400 feet against the grade of the pipes. Not only is this stonkingly daft, but economically pointless, as the situations where it would be useful are both quite rare and varied (i.e. the next fire will not be the same as the last).
4. A much smarter (so outwith your area of "expertise") scheme would be a large fleet of road tankers and mobile infrastructure that could (a) use the most convenient ocean access for the fire and (b) deliver water to the most useful locations in useful quantities (a standard residential hydrant is not terribly useful for a fast-moving wildfire -- ask my ex-girlfriend who lost her home beside a hydrant -- because the fires are BIG and have to be fought on fronts 100s of yards long), and (b) will sit idle 350-something days a year. The only challenge to this approach is that it costs money, and LA _cut_ the Fire Department's budget so as to be able to increase that of the PD without increasing taxes..
5. Your fascist attempts to pretend no-one cares about Los Angeles or California are simply ignorant nonsense. I mean, the LA basin has the two largest ports in the USA, has an economy that would rank it 19th largest in the world (if it were a nation), is home to nearly 10 million people (both those are just LA county, ignoring the neighbors in Riverside, Ventura, Orange, Kern, and San Bernadino), dominates several industries (obviously, entertainment being the most prominent), and so on. We get it: you don't care. But we don't care about you, so there's that.
6. So you were allegedly something to do with firefighting on the USS Midway (a famously lopsided aircraft carrier). Not sure that after the fires on Forrestal, Enterprise, Oriskany, Conyngham, Bonhomme Richard et al that's terribly relevant to firefighting in urban areas (generally less fuel and fewer weapons in a typical house), but you do you.
4. A much smarter (so outwith your area of "expertise") scheme would be a large fleet of road tankers and mobile infrastructure that could (a) use the most convenient ocean access for the fire and (b) deliver water to the most useful locations in useful quantities (a standard residential hydrant is not terribly useful for a fast-moving wildfire -- ask my ex-girlfriend who lost her home beside a hydrant -- because the fires are BIG and have to be fought on fronts 100s of yards long), and (b) will sit idle 350-something days a year. The only challenge to this approach is that it costs money, and LA _cut_ the Fire Department's budget so as to be able to increase that of the PD without increasing taxes..
I wonder how practical that would be? I watched (in horror) as the fire spread from mostly one community in the Palisades to the massive fire(s) it became. I saw some FD tankers, but how well that would cope given the extent of the fires. I also heard that early on, the utility company had diverted water to fill some million+ gallon storage tanks, but it doesn't seem to have been enough. Plus challenges like the community only had a single access road, and that became gridlocked with people trying to evacuate, and trying to get home to save their stuff. So the FD literally bulldozed cars that had been abandoned to gain access.
Presumably the hydrant system wasn't designed for fires on this scale, so assuming it's meant for a few trucks pumping simultaneously and lost pressure due to the number of fire engines trying to get water. I'm guessing 'fixing' that would be a collosal task, ie how to engineer a system that could handle abnormal peaks. Increasing pressure might work, or might just burst pipes and there'd be no water. But it seems like a problem with no easy, or cheap solution.
You also mentioned creosote bushes. That also seems to be a huge problem, especially given the terrain you mentioned. Successive fires and poor (or no) land management has allowed those and other fire tolerant species to spread, and brush clearing to reduce fuel loads would also be a huge & expensive task.. Which seems necessary given once the fires are out, those plants will regrow.
(I don't often agree with this poster, but FWIW I think he's essentially right here. I suspect also he doesn't really care that I think so!!).
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/01/08/california-mobilizes-additional-water-tenders-to-los-angeles-fires/
This is mobilizing 140 water tenders (although it's not clear from where). But it's going to take some time to marshal and deploy them, so if one were thinking about infrastructure improvements (a thing that everyone wants and nobody is prepared to pay for, especially not those who built their political fortunes on cutting taxes), have a fleet of hundreds of tankers and drivers in the LA basin has a lot going for it.... especially since the fleet could be deployed to other fire sites elsewhere in the state if deemed appropriate.
Probably the smartest thing would be to have a state-wide (or west-coast-wide) system where resources are pre-deployed from San Diego to Bellingham, and could be designed to do double-duty to support earthquake response as well as fire response and a hypothetical tsunami response!
But the fatal flaw with this idea is (a) it takes a lot of money to set up (although less than redoing the hydrant system), (b) it takes a continuing flow of money year-on-year to maintain, and (c) ideally it never does anything, making it an attractive target for cost cutters ("the tanker fleet hasn't been used for a couple of years; why are we paying for the useless things?").
(I don't often agree with this poster, but FWIW I think he's essentially right here. I suspect also he doesn't really care that I think so!!).
We're human. If we agreed on everything, the world would be a boring place.
This is mobilizing 140 water tenders (although it's not clear from where). But it's going to take some time to marshal and deploy them, so if one were thinking about infrastructure improvements (a thing that everyone wants and nobody is prepared to pay for, especially not those who built their political fortunes on cutting taxes), have a fleet of hundreds of tankers and drivers in the LA basin has a lot going for it.... especially since the fleet could be deployed to other fire sites elsewhere in the state if deemed appropriate.
Yup. When it started, I heard that due to the weather (not climate) forecasts for low RHEL and high Santa Ana winds, the city had already staged extra firefighting resources.. But it wasn't enough. Video showed FD tendes, but those were mostly small tank trucks rather than full-sized semis. But then those may only hold <3,000 US gallons to 10k for the semis. Then I guess the logistics of where to stage those and if they could ferry from large water mains to semis to small tenders to trucks, especially given the narrow, winding roads in a lot of the communities affected.
I guess one possibility is there's going to be a few hill top plots currently razed, so whether the state could compulsory purchase some of those to build new reservoirs. But those seem to have been one of the problems-
https://www.americaunwon.com/p/why-los-angeles-burned
The state’s last major reservoir project was completed in 1979, when the population was some 23 million. It’s been 50 years, there are now 39 million residents, and progress on the storied California Water Project has stopped.
In 2014, Californians voted overwhelmingly for Prop 1, funding a $7.5 billion bond to construct new water reservoirs and dams, with a deadline of January 1, 2022.
It’s now 2025, and no reservoirs have been built. Proposed projects remain mired in the bureaucratic morass of California politics.
Along with other policy decisions to remove dams, and largely futile efforts to save the Delta Smelt. Plus of course land management to reduce fuel loads. Insurers are facing massive liabilities, and will almost certainly look for any excuse to pass the blame on to the city & state. There's also been some interesting stories coming out of the event-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0eweel5zg3o
On Thursday afternoon, the moment we were dreading happened - we got an emergency evacuation notice.
We panicked, and ran to load the cars again. I checked my car - low on gas - and sent my partner out to find some. He had to drive to four different stations before he found one with any supply.
The alarm, it turned out, was false, a mistake that rattled America's second-largest city, which was already on edge.
Was that really a mistake, especially as their home is now gone? This is one of those things where IT may help or hinder. She said they'd had some false alarms earlier, so if there's a 'cry wolf' aspect. Or, if maybe incomers don't necessarily appreciate the risks. I also heard that radio comms were sketchy, with poor reception, but given the terrrain and possibly network congestion, that isn't suprising. But it was something I learned when I did some training in Huntsville. We started with a tornado appreciation session showing why we should heed the alert system for those, and the instructor made a comment that ignoring the warnings are why some incomers don't live in Alabama for long. Nature doesn't mess around.
a bit too soon.?
Most of the water problems are from houses with automatic fire sprinkler systems. What happens when a few hundred houses have their sprinkler systems activate? Yeah well there ya go...
[I still blame gummint but for the lack of infrastructure upgrades while shelling out tons o' money to illegal aliens and welfare scammers...]
Most of the water problems are from houses with automatic fire sprinkler systems. What happens when a few hundred houses have their sprinkler systems activate? Yeah well there ya go...
And water sprinklers were made mandatory for new builds. There'll be time for a drains-up once the fires are out, and pointed questions raised about population growth vs water supply, reservoir management and land management in general. But I stumbled on a live feed while this was a 70 acre Pallisades fire, and watched it turn pretty apocalyptic. But also hats off to the water bomber pilots flying rotations between ocean and hills to try and put the fires out. That must have been interesting given the thermals & high winds. Nads of steel!
But I've also read comments that this may bankrupt LA, or California in general given the state acts as an insurer of last resort and claims are already estimated to run into the hundreds of billions. Also somewhat ironic given a few weeks ago, I was chatting to someone about the cost of living. Some very nice places to live, but mandatory fire insurance could run $10k+ a month, with $30-40k+ for McMansions.
The line brush maintenance is not done because tree huggers won't allow a single branch to be cut, yet insist all fires be put out even when nature starts them. This is the result.
In my state we clear the line right of ways regularly. In fact, they did the lines around my area just last month. We also have regular controlled burns. What we do not have are wildfires. I'll be doing a controlled burn on the 18 acres I live on later this year.
This is total nonsense, spouted by someone who has no idea what the terrain in the hills around Los Angeles actually is. Good luck with a "controlled burn" in a dry, steep-sided canyon!
Maintenance on the power line rights of way was not being done because the power companies didn't want to pay for it. Simple as that. However, there's no indication (as yet) what caused these fires.
So you might have been USN (maybe, but I have my doubts) but literally every single statement you made is wrong. Factually incorrect. Not just wrong but stupid wrong. You know nothing about wildfires. You know nothing about fighting wildfires. You dont know how the urban water distribution system works. You know nothing about the California water distribution network. You know nothing about CARB, CalEPA, Coastal Commission etc and their role in the current disaster. Or why it has nothing to do with a PG&E scandal almost 30 years ago. And so on. When it comes to ignorance on the subject you have a perfect score.
Ever seen a wildfire up close? A wall of flames several hundred feet high several miles long? Of course not. You're just some junior naval rating who might have once done drills which were little more than p*ssing foam on JP-5. For 15 mins. Maybe spend a few hours with some of the fire crews on a holding a fireline in the Santa Monica Mountains and learn just how profound and total your ignorance is. You know jack sh*t. about real world fire fighting. You know jack sh*t about what is really involved in fighting, constraining and suppressing vey large wind-driven wildfires.
That was really interesting. I did not know that was done.
"The state of California considers the inmates in the program as firefighters, but after they leave prison they find it hard to find employment. A majority of California’s fire departments require their employees to be EMT certified. ... EMT certifications are not issued to people with two or more felony convictions, released from prison for drug offenses in the past five years, or who have two or more misdemeanor convictions related to force, threat, violence, intimidation, and theft"
Everyone already knows California the US was a bag of assholes, I guess, but here ya go. I'll point to this every time someone says prison is for rehabilitation.
"Chain Gang"
(Hoh! Ah!) I hear something saying (Hoh! Ah!)
(Hoh! Ah!)(Well don't you know)
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, ga-ang
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, gang
All day long they're singing (Hoh! Ah!)
(Well don't you know)
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, ga-ang
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, gang
All day long they work so hard till the sun is going down
Working on the highways and byways and wearing, wearing a frown
You hear they moaning their lives away
Then you hear somebody say
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, ga-ang
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, gang
Can't you hear them singing, mmm (Hoh! Ah!)
I'm going home one of these days
I'm going home, see my woman
Whom I love so dear
But meanwhile I gotta work right here
(Well don't you know)
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, ga-ang
That's the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, gang
All day long they're singing, mmm (Hoh! Ah!)
My work is so hard
Give me water
I'm thirsty, my work is so hard
Woah ooo
My work is so hard
Just a heads up, but people rightly get a bit twitchy when you start appropriating the word “slave” when applying it to people who are a) free to not do it and b) do technically get paid (just not well, particularly compared to non-incarcerated firefighters - but then they don’t have rent, utilities and food bills to pay..)
To compare that to genuine slave labour is a stretch.
Good Grief, the level of ignorance in this 'chat' is overwhelming.
Here's a Common Sense question:
"what are the benefits to inmates who assist in fighting the California fires"
"California reduces the sentences of inmates who help fight wildfires12. The state offers a "2 for 1" credit system, where each day spent combating fires earns prisoners two days off their sentences1. Support staff receive a "1 for 1" credit, reducing their sentences by one day for each day worked1. This time credit system is a key incentive for inmates to participate in the firefighting program, allowing them to potentially shorten their overall incarceration period significantly"
"Sentence reduction: Participants can earn time credits that reduce their prison sentences13.
Wages: Inmates earn daily wages ranging from $5.80 to $10.24, with an additional $1 per day during active emergencies36.
Skills and training: The program provides valuable firefighting skills and training, which can be useful for future employment opportunities15.
Job opportunities: The program paves the way for several job opportunities after release, including advanced training1.
Criminal record expungement: Participants may be eligible for criminal record expungement upon completion of the program1.
Rehabilitation: The program is viewed by supporters as serving a rehabilitative purpose2.
Education grants: While not specifically mentioned for the fire camp program, the California Conservation Corps (a similar program) offers $15,000 education grants that can be applied to college or fire academy attendance
It's important to note that participation in this program is voluntary and only available to inmates who meet specific criteria, including good behavior and having no more than eight years remaining on their sentences"
The story only mentions Pacific Palisades and then speaks of how close it is to JPL. They are miles apart. JPL is threatened by the :"Eaton Fire" which is equally horrific, but isn't the same fire. See https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2025/1/7/eaton-fire and mouse around. There are. lot of fires all going on at the same time, which makes life much, much harder for the firefighters (as if two horrific massive blazes weren't enough of a challenge!).
For writers based in London, I'd not be surprised at the lack of understanding ... but Ian is based in the SF Bay Area ... where one would have hoped an understanding of California's size and geography would be "table stakes" for a journalist.
it all tends to grow back after an occasional good rain. Southern CA, including LA and San Diego (where I am) is "Coastal Desert" so when it DOES rain, infrequently as it often is, it tends to storm and sometimes flood. If land management is done right, undergrowth and excess brush is removed, wires are relocated underground, water supplies are upgraded, etc. If enviro wacko "save the latest endangered species of the week" nutbags get in the way, and/or politicians squander all of the funds and apply DEI bureaucracy and red tape to every "solution", you get a lot of "the last couple of days" when conditions are ripe.
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You would think that the followers of a benevolent god would not have spent the last fifty years knowingly damning his creation to fire and flood, but here we are.
Of course for those who partake there's a whole bit at the end of the bible where the people who believe themselves to be righteous all follow the antichrist. I read it as a kid and it seemed a bit silly, but it lines up well with America as we see it today.
I saw a news report where the brother of one of the victims in the recent New Orleans atrocities took comfort that God had clearly foreseen the incident and ensured they had enjoyed the best Christmas ever together as a family.
Whatever gets you through these things, but I’m not sure if I would have had the same level of gratitude.
I'll start by saying I live on the other side of the ocean so I know bugger all about California or how things are organised there, so keep that in mind.
Now, my question, given that these fires are a known known (though, admittedly not to the scale of the current one), is why aren't there large fire breaks? Which, granted, may not be terribly effective with hurricane force winds, but looking at pictures on the news it looks like the only breaks are roads and people's homes.
Also, in a known fire zone, is it not a requirement to maintain a clear area (of non burny things) around properties?
Also, in a known fire zone, is it not a requirement to maintain a clear area (of non burny things) around properties?
It should be.. But.. $$$$. So developers buy up land plots, build right up to the property lines to maximise sq footage and thus no fire breaks or setbacks. Then who owns the land between properties and should be responsible for reducing fire loads. I don't think it's helped by the desire to be king of the hill given fire travels.. up hill. And developers try to cram as many houses as they can on hills and hillsides.
But then something I noticed is the way a structure or tree catches fire, the wind whips embers downwind, those lodge on other property or vegetation and the fire jumps roads and fire breaks. Maybe building codes could be changed so houses are just less flammable, and roof shingles don't ignite, blow away and spread the fire. Downside, that would increase costs in an area where property is already unaffordable for a lot of the population.
I'm not an expert either, but I am aware that town planning includes sports fields on the outskirts of a town as a firebreak. A football field doesn't fit on a mountain slope. Also, in a pricey district, more houses are going to be built than sports grounds. Planning may change in the wake of such disasters. The winds are recorded at 160kmph, picking up burning branches and hurling them way ahead of the fire front. Exploding propane tanks propagate the fire. The scale and speed of the fires this century has surpassed previous preparations.
The other commenters blame developers, but ignore the real cause - tree huggers. For 70+ years these people have fought against logging while at the same time fought against allowing even the smallest fire to burn. Nature has always used fire to keep debris down, and the trees were not only tough enough to survive the occasional light fire, their propagation methods sometimes require the heat of fire to germinate.
They should have either let nature take its course and burn the debris out, or allowed controlled logging that also required logging companies to clear all debris and replant the same species being taken. This would have kept the debris cleared while also keeping fires down. That would leave the problem of getting seeds to germinate from the trees that require it, but that's what manmade fire can do.
That's not to say irresponsible development had no hand in the problem, but the real problem has always been tree huggers stopping both man and nature from managing the forests.
When the wind blows at 90mph, it doesn't really matter if you have boundaries.
Have a squint at Google Earth: you'll see that JPL *has* clear space on three sides.
But the other side of the coin is that while the fire break areas represent unrealized real estate development, they _also_ require upkeep. This is SoCal: things grow there 365.24 days a year!
The last point is the terrain doesn't favor large fire breaks. They aren't terribly obvious most of the time (because the inversion layer causes poor visibility) but the "hills" around the LA basin are real, steep sided mountains. The closest high peak above Altadena (where the Eaton fire is) is "only" 1427m, so a bit taller than Ben Nevis, and it's about 2 miles from the town!
I was wondering something similar.....
California has had to devise, adopt and enforce some pretty tough building codes for earthquakes. Is there anything similar for fire?
What is the construction of most houses in the affected area?
I have been amazed on my american travels, just how much wood and timber is used in construction. Some houses are literally 100% wooden, with bitumen type layers as tiles. All seems very flammable to me, especially in such a hot, dry area (OK, LA is usually pretty humid), but into the mountains is a different story.
Some of the pictures showing the damage showing concrete shelled buildings still standing, or a brick/stone fireplace and chimney the only thing left amongst a pile of ash.
Would the construction of more brick, stone, concrete buildings, and a proper slate/tiled roof, with little exterior woodwork be more fire resistant?
Any thoughts?
Now would be the time to revise codes, before the rebuilding gets underway.
Brick is mostly incompatible with seismic safety. Concrete has similar issues (which is why the freeway bridges collapse). Slate/tile is better than wood roofing, but fireproof (ceramic) tiles exist and are purpose designed... but they all cost more money, and there's already a shortage of new housing in California (presumably from all the people who hate it so much that they move there).
One of the challenges is deciding what problems you're building for: typical building fires would like interior sprinklers and fire-suppression systems, but wildfires need exterior systems throwing water on the roofs of buildings (to quench sparks and embers).
When all the fires are out and people begin picking through what's left of their precious belongings, the big question will be 'how did this start'? When a fire starts during hurricane-force winds with the relative humidity in the teens, there is precious little you can do to stop the spread. Fire breaks the size of football fields can't stop it. Concrete highways that are wider than football fields can't stop it. You can minimize the chances of your house being one that catches fire with stucco siding, a tile roof, and enclosed eaves, but that's no guarantee.
All you can do is run for your life and wait for the winds to die down - then sue the power company (LADWP or SCE) whose power line started the fire, throw the arsonist in prison for life, and/or get rid of homeless encampments. Oh - and start building a retaining wall for the massive mudflows that will happen during the next rainstorm.
Word from a friend who's going into his third night shift in the Emergency Operation Center at JPL is that it's still there. Major concern remains wind-blown embers, but the nearest point of the Eaton fire is slightly less than half a mile away, but fortunately (for them) the wind is shifting to the north a touch, so the campus is not immediately downwind of the blaze.
I am a firefighter in Australia. We are based on the outskirts of a major city with the suburbs now making up most of our area and surrounded by national parks and steep wooded terrain.
Sadly much like California bush fires are just a fact of life here and access to water is also something we certainly don't have an expectation of. As a result there has been a concerted effort to model where alternate water sources form swimming pools to dams and creeks are and to have them signposted. In my area you see fire service SWR signs everywhere on peoples front fences to signify they have a pool or other static water source and our large fleet of heavy water carriers the "bulkies" are set up to pull water from them and distribute where required.
With fires this large like the devastating 2019/2020 fires water alone just isn't enough and no infrastructure on earth could supply enough water to make a difference - so we have to use the terrain, weather and fire to fight the fire. Bush firefighting over the last few years has become as strategic a battlefield as any war, with the command centres running powerful environmental models to plot fire spread based on topography, weather, fuel loads and other pertinent factors - including very often an expectation that critical infrastructure such as pumping stations will go offline, taking out what hydrants we do have.