Southern California Fire Weather Update - Updated 6:45pm PST

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6:45pm: Evidently, one or two new fires have broken out this evening. High winds continue.



--- original posting as of 2pm PST ---

Here is the wildfire weather forecast for Thursday as of 2pm PST:
While still "critical" (red), conditions for wildfires are not expected to be as bad tomorrow (Thursday) as today or yesterday. 

As of 6:45pm, Southern California Edison's primary reporting system has stopped working. We do not now how many are without power at this point. 
Power is out, mostly cut proactively, to more than 1.5 homes and businesses which equates to about 4.5 million people! 

Here's the Los Angeles Times' fire map as of 2:55pm:




----- original posting ----

Power has been proactively cut in parts of Southern California to help prevent additional fires. This is as of 8am. Please keep in mind the 300K number refers to homes and businesses which equals about 1 million people. [update 8:02a] Another 40K lost power in the past two minutes (note shown).
Scroll down for the wildfire weather forecast.

This morning's headlines in the Southland are grim. Per KABC, officials are calling this fire outbreak "unprecedented."



The Forecast for Today
Purple is the rare, highest category of wildfire danger. Winds have been clocked to 100 mph in the Southland already this morning. Red is "critical" and orange is "elevated."

Please don't drag chains or throw cigarette butts or engage in any other activity that could cause a fire.

While Northern California has received plentiful rains this season, the Southland is extremely dry. There are many reports that the fire hydrants in many areas are not working. To give you an idea of the desperation, I screen grabbed these images from KABC-TV of a woman --- desperately --- taking a kitchen bowl from a neighbor's sink to then run to put out some burning shrubbery and repeating. 


While prayers are always helpful, it looks like we will need to make donations to assist. I'll keep you advised as I get more information. 

A note on the forecasts (8:30am PST):
Congratulations to the NWS Storm Prediction Center (which creates fire weather forecasts) and the local NWS offices for an important job well done. 


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