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Wildfire Grows To 6,000 Acres Near Napa Valley; Evacuations Ordered

Wildfire Grows To 6,000 Acres Near Napa Valley; Evacuations Ordered

By Joseph Serna and Matt Hamilton, Los Angeles Times (TNS)

LOS ANGELES — Unpredictable winds and difficult terrain helped a fast-moving brush fire near Lake Berryessa grow 1,000 acres overnight and has triggered more evacuations in Napa and Sonoma counties, fire officials said Thursday.

The Wraggs fire was 6,000 acres and only 5 percent contained Thursday morning, a 1,000-acre increase in a single night, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

“The fire has remained … at a rapid rate of spread,” Cal Fire said in a news release. “The terrain is brush-covered, rugged and steep, with difficult access. Winds are erratic.”

The blaze first broke out about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday near Highway 128 and Greaves Road, Cal Fire said.

Flames spread swiftly through the steep, rugged terrain near the borders of Napa, Solano, and Yolo counties, Cal Fire officials said.

Evacuations were ordered for Cold Canyon, Mix Canyon, and Quail Ridge. Three hikers in Cold Canyon were rescued, said Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant. Campers in the Canyon Creek and Lake Solano campgrounds were also evacuated, officials said.

About 200 structures are threatened in the Quail Ridge Community, Cal Fire reported. The Red Cross has opened an evacuation center.

An estimated 525 firefighters are battling the flames, which prompted a closure of Highway 128 and Wragg Canyon, according to the state fire agency.

A vehicle collision was initially believed to have sparked the blaze. The exact cause remains under investigation, Berlant said.

The Red Cross opened a shelter for evacuees at the Winters Community Center in Winters, California.

Photo: USFWS/Southeast via Flickr

Shaking From Napa Earthquake Was Highest Ever Recorded In Area

Shaking From Napa Earthquake Was Highest Ever Recorded In Area

By Rosanna Xia and Rong-Gong Lin Ii, Los Angeles Times

NAPA, California — The ground-shaking during the magnitude 6.0 Napa earthquake was the highest level recorded in modern times for downtown Napa, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The ground motion recorded in downtown Napa came very close to the maximum level of ground shaking engineers use in their calculations when designing new buildings in that area, said Erol Kalkan, a USGS research structural engineer.

Newer buildings withstood the shaking and performed as expected, surviving with cosmetic damage, Kalkan said.

Longtime Napa residents described the earthquake as something particularly more violent than what they felt during the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and the 2000 Napa Valley earthquake.

“This one was very, very different,” said retiree Sherry Vattuone, 70. “My bed went up and down … like the ‘Exorcist’-type thing, and then it slid, and then all of a sudden there, it was like something took the house and went like this” — shaking her hand — “just as hard as they could.”

It wasn’t only her pasta bowls and half of her San Francisco Giants bobbleheads that were smashed in the quake: her home now leans askew, with her basement leaning at a sickly angle from the upper floor.

City officials said her home could not be occupied because the house had shifted from the underpinning foundation, and she was forced to move into a trailer a neighbor loaned her, parked outside her home, where she lives with her three dogs: Daisy, Dusty, and Duncan.

About 150 buildings have been red-tagged, meaning they are too dangerous to be entered, and about 1,000 more that are yellow-tagged, meaning there may be limited access to the structure due to damage, Rick Tooker, director of Napa’s Community Development Department, said Tuesday.

While strong for Napa, the Aug. 24 earthquake did not produce ground shaking as intense as was felt during the 1994 Northridge earthquake. That temblor produced ground motions about 50 percent more intense than what was recorded in Napa, said USGS research geologist Dan Ponti.

High-quality recordings like the one in downtown Napa provide valuable data and have only been available in the last two decades as more and more recording instruments have been placed throughout California, said David Oppenheimer, a USGS seismologist and project chief of the earthquake monitoring project.

During the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, for example, USGS had about 70 recordings that weren’t of that high a quality. If a similar earthquake occurred in the Bay Area today, the USGS would have about 400 instruments recording ground motions at a much higher quality, Oppenheimer said. “That would give us a much greater and varied picture of the earthquake,” he said.

AFP Photo/Josh Edelson

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Napa Earthquake: Damage Assessment Won’t Come Easy

Napa Earthquake: Damage Assessment Won’t Come Easy

By David DeBolt, San Jose Mercury News

NAPA, Calif. — Power is back on citywide, business is trickling back into downtown, and the first day of school arrives Wednesday. As life in some sense returns to the North Bay after Sunday’s magnitude-6.0 earthquake and the subsequent days of emergency recovery, residents in Napa, Vallejo and American Canyon are taking stock of the damage, and asking: How much will it cost to repair and rebuild?

They aren’t finding a quick answer.

The estimates, by some accounts, could be in the hundreds of millions. But local, state and federal officials meeting Tuesday to tally up the damage left behind from Sunday’s earthquake faced obstacles to getting a clear figure, Napa County Supervisor Mark Luce said.

Some buildings, including the Napa municipal courthouse, remain too dangerous to enter, so no one knows the actual damage. Leaders have sent out surveys to private companies, but have not heard back from many, Luce said. And aftershocks that shook the region Tuesday meant further evaluation of some structures might be needed.

Half of the region’s wineries responding to a survey reported total damages estimated at $38 million. The threshold for the region to qualify for federal relief is $55 million, the amount of public buildings in the region that are not covered by insurance, Luce said.

“It’s one thing to know if you have damage, it’s another thing to know the estimate,” Luce said. “Most people are still picking up the glass. I don’t want to venture a guess cause I’ll be eating my words.”

In Napa, the number of buildings with red tags, signaling that they are uninhabitable, rose to 103, and 20 more were expected to be added to the list late Tuesday, officials said. Another 500 were yellow-tagged, meaning they could be entered for recovery and cleanup, but were not safe to inhabit until repairs were made.

In Vallejo, initial damage estimates were at $5.2 million, but that figure is expected to grow. Twelve buildings were red-tagged and another 75 were yellow-tagged.

In the coming days, Napa’s downtown, depending on the block, will be surrounded by fences or frequented by diners. One thousand feet of fencing has been ordered to be put up near crumbling buildings, which could include the post office, historic courthouse, Goodman Library and multiple structures on Brown Street. Turn a corner onto Main Street, however, and several businesses are welcoming customers.

“They keep opening up,” Napa Mayor Jill Techel said. “Every time I walk down the street, there’s a new store open.”

Meanwhile, more Earth shaking returned to the region Tuesday morning — a 3.9-magnitude jolt at 5:33 a.m. and three other aftershocks within a little more than one hour, causing cracks in area highways. In all, 80 aftershocks have been recorded in the major quake’s wake, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.

The number of those injured rose by one to 209. A woman hit in the head by debris during the earthquake but who did not go to the hospital suffered a seizure Monday evening and underwent surgery, according to city officials.

Officials closed lanes on Highways 29 and 37 on Tuesday to repair damage exacerbated by the aftershocks.

Crews were working in Napa and Vallejo to repair dozens of reported water line breaks.

After two days of canceled classes, Napa Valley Unified School officials said that schools would be open on Wednesday.

AFP Photo/Josh Edelson

Napa Valley, Shaking Off Earthquake, Says It’s Open For Business

Napa Valley, Shaking Off Earthquake, Says It’s Open For Business

By Hugo Martin, Los Angeles Times

Only hours after the shaking stopped from the biggest quake to hit Napa Valley in 25 years, the phones at Mike Noel’s Napa, Calif., travel agency began to ring. Anxious clients wondered whether the magnitude 6.0 shaker would derail their visit.

“I’ve been telling them that it’s business as usual,” said Noel, who specializes in arranging high-end wine country tours.

Across the valley north of San Francisco, other travel agents, hotel managers, and winemakers are declaring Napa Valley open for business in hopes the quake doesn’t frighten off the 3 million annual visitors who spend $1.4 billion in the region.

With the peak summer season winding down, Napa Valley tourism officials say the effect of the quake should be minimal. Some experts said television footage of broken wine bottles and damaged hotels might even pique long-term interest in the region.

“I wouldn’t underestimate the impact of giving tons of mentions in the news about the area,” said Carl Winston, program director for San Diego State University’s school of hospitality and tourism management.

When Mammoth Mountain was struck by volcanic tremors in 1998, it did little to scare off skiers and snowboarders, Winston said. “In the short term, it is inconvenient but it is far from catastrophic,” he said.

Napa Valley hotel managers say many rooms are booked for the harvest season already and the grape crush in October.

“The crush is about to happen and people are going to come,” said Jeff Perry, general manager of the 59-room Napa Winery Inn, which sustained only cosmetic damage and remains open.

The quake, which struck at 3:20 a.m. Sunday, closed only two of nearly 150 hotels in the valley and damaged about a dozen of the valley’s 500 or so wineries, according to Napa Valley tourism officials. About 90 to 100 homes were labeled unfit to enter, and half a dozen people suffered serious injuries.

Many travelers with upcoming trips to Napa Valley have been calling hotels and wineries to check on the extent of the damage, but few if any have canceled plans, according to hotel managers and local tourism officials.

Ashley Cote, a food and travel blogger from Florida, said she will go ahead with her vacation next week after confirming that her hotel was open and that the quake damage around the valley was minimal.

“The only way we would cancel is if it was unsafe for us to travel,” Cote said. “I have been looking forward to this trip for months and would hate to pass up the opportunity to visit Napa Valley.”

The effect on tourism may be muted because most people visit Napa Valley for only a few hours.

Of Napa Valley’s 3 million annual visitors, about two-thirds drive in for the day from other parts of California, such as San Francisco, according to a 2012 economic impact study by Destination Analysts Inc. The rest of the visitors stay in local hotels and inns.

Visitors spend an average of $459 a day, with overnight guests spending an average of $708 a day, according to the study. Visitors staying with friends or relatives spend an average of $447 a day, while day visitors spend $350.

Tourists spend the biggest share of their money, 35 percent, on shopping, followed by lodging (24 percent), and restaurants (22 percent), the study found. Wine tasting rooms and dining are the most popular activities.

Those worried about quake damage centered around downtown Napa can go to hotels, wineries, and restaurants in towns such as Yountville, St. Helena, and Calistoga, said Clay Gregory, president and chief executive of Visit Napa Valley.

“There are plenty of things to do in the towns up and down the valley,” he said.

Napa Valley Vintners, a nonprofit trade association, said this year’s weather has been ideal for grapes, marking the third straight year of supreme growing conditions.

The quake did not harm the vineyards or the grapes on the vine, the association said.

“While some individual wineries may experience inventory shortages as a result of the earthquake, it is not expected to have a significant impact on Napa Valley wine inventory in general,” the group said.

Photo via WikiCommons

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