Pittsburg, PA
Last resort: Contra Costa County firefighters flood burning wetlands with 1.2 million gallons of water per hour
After seven weeks of failed makes an attempt to cease a marshland blaze close to Pittsburg with conventional land and air techniques, fireplace officers have switched to an unconventional, flood-the-zone tactic, utilizing 1.2 million gallons of water each hour to lastly put out the flames.
The Contra Costa Water District began diverting water from the Mallard Slough space beginning Saturday afternoon to douse the Marsh Hearth, which has burned by way of decayed peat and different vegetation because it ignited on Might 28 at a homeless encampment.
The property proprietor of the burning property additionally introduced in massive pumps over the weekend to extend the circulate, mentioned Steve Hill, spokesman for the Contra Costa Hearth Safety District.
It might take as much as every week to completely flood the world and put the fireplace out, Hill mentioned, though the 60 million gallons already poured into the world appeared to be working.
“We need to get the water there as rapidly as we are able to,” he mentioned. “It appears as if we’re getting some impact.”
1.2 million gallons, the quantity poured on the fireplace per hour, is equal to 2 Olympic-sized swimming swimming pools, or the quantity of water 25,000 Californians would use in a day.
Officers acknowledged that the flooding possibility raised environmental considerations, particularly given the drought, and required approvals from a number of businesses, but it surely gave the impression to be the one possibility left.
“We had tried all of the extra typical strategies of extinguishing that fireplace,” Hill mentioned. “It simply proved to be ineffective.”
The fireplace has burned by way of greater than 500 acres of decomposing peat and brush in an space with unstable soil, the place fireplace vans might sink or fall into holes the place the fireplace is burning beneath the grass.
It’s commonplace for wetlands fires to burn for weeks or months. Dropping water from the air — or ready it out — have been the one choices obtainable.
Whereas the fireplace had been burning for weeks, warmth and winds kicked up the flames and unfold simply over every week in the past pushing extra smoke into neighboring communities and forcing fireplace officers to launch an assault from the air.
“On Monday and Tuesday, we dumped about 400,000 gallons of water — one 660-gallon bucket at a time — on the fireplace, and it had little to no impact,” Hill mentioned. “That serves to point out the problem we face.”
The fireplace at one level threatened overhead PG&E energy traces and neared decommissioned industrial vegetation, together with a former energy plant that’s owned by GenOn.
Ready it out was now not an possibility, and flooding was the final resort, Hill mentioned.
Hearth officers mentioned final week they have been engaged on the approval for the flooding possibility, a bureaucratic battle that concerned the Environmental Safety Company, the U.S. Military Corps of Engineers, Regional Water High quality Management Board and the native mosquito abatement district, and doubtless others, Hill mentioned.
With smelly smoke persevering with to push its means throughout the area, prompting air high quality advisories for Pittsburg, Antioch, Oakley and Brentwood, and after permission was granted, they lined up the pumps and opened the gates to flood the area.
Officers mentioned they have been diverting water from the Delta and Contra Costa Water District.
Workers author Michael Cabanatuan contributed to this story.
Jill Tucker is a San Francisco Chronicle workers author. E-mail: jtucker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jilltucker