Did gases from a dump ignite the Santiago fire?

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right on, eva.





does janice have a point that dump sites are possible danger to residents even long after they have been closed? quite possibly, yes.


should people be more proactive in finding out more about where their communities are located in relation to former landfills? YES. the issue has been discussed heavily in regards to PS so no one is doubting there's a legitimate concern.


was the santiago fire a result of dump site dangers? unless we have reason to believe the OCFA is flat out lying to us, NO!





janice, i think it would be helpful to share some of your insights and research on the subject since your website says you've following this since the 80s. what spurred this "crusade"? it would be helpful to separate out the dump site issue from this specific fire or else no one is going to listen to you. many folks on this forum have been accused of crazy talk but after sharing their reasoning, their specific knowledge of topics ended up being well-regarded. (bkshopr)
 
OC Register update: now it is 2 spots of origin instead 3, with evidence to prove that the fire was caused by arson.



Reward up to $150k now. That's a nice "little" start for a down payment :)
 
It's bad to build over a dump partly because you are asking for your

slab to crack. Dumps are squooshy; you want to build over something firm. Contractors here are literally required to "pound sand", so it is nice and firm and the slab doesn't crack. In some areas in Florida, building is prohibitively expensive because you have to get the muck scraped off.



As to methane, the 2 dumps I pass to and from Miami and the space

coast have torches with blue flames burning off the methane. Yes, it

would be better to collect it and sell it, but doubt if profit could be made on this. Meanwhile, I don't understand what closing a dump would do

to the methane; I surmise it would continue to be generated. Assuming

there are lots of vents, that might be ok, but contractors at dumps are no different from contractors anywhere else, and probably cut corners leaving the possibilties of explosions.



That said, I don't think there is any evidence that these fire were caused by methane explosions. And the size of the explosion would depend if a little or a lot of methane had built up.
 
Modern landfills are designed to prevent gas and water seepage through the subsurface, and the gases are given a place to vent. Old landfills are another story. I know of a golf course in Japan built on an old landfill. There are numerous vent stacks giving off methane gas. Smoking is strictly prohibited on the golf course for obvious reasons.





Methane is highly combustible, but it still requires something, or someone, to ignite it. An arsonist would probably get torched for their efforts.
 
<p><em>There are numerous vent stacks giving off methane gas.</em></p>

<p>For a minute there I thought you were talking about Oak Creek. Speaking of which, why do they have menthane vents for the buildings in Oak Creek?</p>
 
While methane is combustible, you need sufficient PPM concentrations and an ignition source for it to burn. The Santa ana winds were so fierce on that day that any gassing of methane would have been blown into minuscule PPM concentrations to make ignition nearly impossible. Sure, under the right conditions and source, a gassing of methane and a spark could ignite the methane. However, you usually need a much larger critical mass before an explosion occurs.





Like others said, I fully support your cause and concern on toxic dumps and commend you on your efforts. However, IMO I have not read or seen any evidence to support methane ignition as the source of Santiago fire. The fact that the winds were so fierce would alone make methane ignition such a low probability.
 
"Arson investigators homed in today on two spots... - 6:13 p.m. ...where the 23,000-acre Santiago Canyon fire was set, changing their theory that the blaze was ignited in three areas. A liquid was used to light the fire along Santiago Canyon Road in two separate points. The fluid flowed along a channel to a third location, giving the appearance that there were three ignition spots."



End of story.
 
EvaL



This is the California Waste Management site that lists the closed Silverado Canyon Disposal Station #9:



www.energy.ca.gov/pier/renewable/documents/total_landfills_in_ca.xls



The list of closed dumps is quite extensive.

Janice
 
Janice,



Why wouldn't the arson investigators consider the factor of a closed dump site in their investigation? Are you suggesting they are being deliberate or incompetent? What gives you that belief?
 
tealeaf

I don't know why the closed dump isn't being mentioned as a possible cause of the fire. I did contact the County Fire Department to let them know that a closed dumpsite was at the same location as the origin of the fire. I mentioned methane gas was in most dumps, that it was highly flammable and explosive, etc. The woman taking the message seemed quite uninterested. "We know it was arson," she said.

She assumed it was arson. I try never to assume.

Janice
 
Janice - Why are you <strong>assuming</strong> that the Orange County Fire Department does not know what they are talking about? Why are you <strong>assuming</strong> that they do not know that it was arson?
 
I saw this morning that FOX sent a news crew to watch what the feds were doing in their investigation. They had planted a bunch of evidence flags around some large black glass bottles in the brush.
 
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