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Wildfire at Vandenberg Air Force Base Threatens ULA, SpaceX Launches (latimes.com)
Longtime Slashdot reader Bruce Perens writes: A fire at Vandenberg Air Force Base on the California coast -- currently over 10,000 acres in size -- has approached the pads used by SpaceX and United Launch Alliance. No structures have been damaged, but power lines have been destroyed. There is about 1000 feet of firebreak around each pad, but the presence of smoke and the absence of electrical power is potentially a problem for rockets, payloads, and ground-support equipment. The WorldView 4 satellite, a Delta 4 rocket, and a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with at least 7 (potentially 11) Iridium satellites are known to be on site. Ground support equipment at the base constitutes the United States' only access to polar orbit for large rockets without overflying populated areas. Liquid oxygen stored on the site may already have been released as a precaution or boiled off, and there are large supplies of rocket fuel, but these have so far not been a hazard. The Soberanes fire near Big Sur, located 180 miles farther South on the California coast, has gone on for two months, burning 185 square miles and costing over $200 million dollars to fight with no end in sight. Obviously, it's dry out there. The fire forced officials to cancel the Atlas V rocket launch on Sunday, and the next attempt won't occur for a week.
Man SpaceX just can't catch a break. Two nasty explosions (One on the damn pad) and now serious danger of fire damage to launch facilities, although I assume the pad itself is probably pretty safe ( I mean what can a bush fire do that a rocket engine exploding to pieces cant , right? )
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
Seriously? We are supposed to be afraid of a little brush fire, when the damn thing has to be built to withstand the fires of hell every time a missile is launched?
And, with the drought, they don't have any water to put it out. (Yes, I know Vandenberg is ocean-adjacent. I was making a joke.)
Nothing to see here move along.
They're just trying to get rid of the Andromeda strain.
Captcha: sequel!
...Wildfire, Vandenberg!?
Sounds like the Andromeda Strain to me!
I mean never mind all the property that has been destroyed, the huge amount of forest destroyed and wildlife killed and peoples lives put in danger. No, lets pity a space company run by a billionaire that is adding to the problem of climate change launching rockets using huge amounts of fuel (even if its just H2+O2 that still requires vast amounts of energy to create) carrying yet more soon-to-be space junk into orbit.
Well north (not "South" [sic]) of Vandenberg?
I realize there are other reasons, but I initially found it funny that fire getting near a launch pad was threatening it. I was thinking, "Don't these things get bathed in fire, every time they're used? Shouldn't they have that whole 'flame retardant' thing figured out by now?"
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
It's hidden under a USDA facility in Flatrock, Nevada.
Anyone else but me read just that far into the title and thought that the US military read the first part of Micheal Crichton's book The Andromeda Straight, and that they thought that it really would be a good idea to fund a secret bio-warfare laboratory for studying extraterrestrial organisms?
Wildfire Arrested For Violating SpaceX Restraining Order
This is why you don't date wildfires.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Big Sur is _north_ of the AFB.
Can ANYONE who writes this crap look at a map?
> The Soberanes fire near Big Sur, located 180 miles farther South on the California coast, has gone on for two months, burning 185 square miles and costing over $200 million dollars to fight with no end in sight.
Nope, wrong way around. Big Sur is North of Vandenberg.
Big Sur is North, not South, Oops! Sorry.
The fire is now at 12,000 acres, 45% contained.
Fire is part of the forest ecosystem, to the point that many trees are evolved to need fire to open their seed cones, and other trees are evolved to sprout back from underground after a fire, and fire is needed to open the canopy to new growth and remove debris from the forest floor. Man disrupts the fire cycle by preventing fires to protect property. Thus, when it does burn, you get a big conflagration due to all of the stored fuel. The area where the fire started had not burned in 40 years. Perhaps that was a mistake.
I was at the base on Friday the 16th to see the first attempt at the launch. It's a long drive from Berkeley. There was some smog at the time, perhaps from the Soberanes fire, but no local fires visible. I viewed the launch attempt from Hawk's Nest and drove down Ocean Ave. to Surf Beach later on. That's about as close as you can get to the SpaceX and ULA pads. The area where the fire started is really far within the base gates - not anything an outsider could have gotten to.
Bruce Perens.
According to my map, Big Sur is actually located about 160 miles north of Vandenberg AFB.
Too many visitors don't reads the previous comments, where it has already been pointed out several times that Big Sur is indeed North of Vandenberg. Many more will continue to point this out. Maybe I should keep count. Or maybe there can be a way to score them all redundant.
Beware of the Redittor who loans you a Sharpie.