lilfluff

On the way to work and on the way home I had the chance to observe flagpoles, noticing some at half mast and others not. For those who don't know, yesterday 19 fire fighters were killed fighting a fire near Yarnell, Arizona yesterday. These were 19 of 20 members of a single hotshot crew (essentially the elite of wildfire fire fighting crews). They were based out of Prescott, meaning one small town has now suffered 19 deaths and taken a big hit to their own fire fighting capabilities. So as I looked at the flagpoles I found myself asking why so few of them were at half mast.

Fire fighters are everyday heroes. Day or night, war or peace, every season and any weather they stand ready to throw themselves into harms way to not merely protect our lives but to simply protect our property. Often doing so knowing that we did something foolish to create the problem to begin with. I remember hearing about five or so years ago during a spike in gas prices about a home that burned down because someone decided to hoard gasoline. They filled twenty or so gas cans and then stuck them all into an indoor closet -- where fumes collected until one tiny spark started a blaze that burned the place down. Seeing such foolishness fire fighters don't abandon us, they put out the fire, shake their heads, and head back to the station and prepare for the next fire. And unless they're showing up to fight a fire at our own home our thanks for them is usually grumbling on our part when we have to pull over to let their truck pass by. Or worse trying to take advantage of their presence to speed through traffic putting them at risk of accidents.

So for lack of a better conclusion I'll simply ask, why the hell aren't more of the flags at half mast here in Arizona and suggest that you thank the next fire fighter you see. They may not be around to thank tomorrow.

I have been known to joke that Arizona's claim to have a monsoon season is a joke. Or one of those marketing lies like when early settlers called the not-so-green Greenland, Greenland in order to attract more settlers. "You're going to call this place Barrenland, Carl? Who's going to move to Barrenland to raise a family. Call it... Greenland! No, no it's not a lie Carl, it's spinning the message. Carl, put the ax down Carl..."

( Oh look, a weather rant under the cut )

But you know what? Arizona has borrowed another foreign weather related word. Haboob. It's basically Arabic for, "It's the end of the world! Oh, wait. Never mind, it's just a miles and miles long wall of dust." We got one here in the Phoenix area the other day. Want to see it? Fortunately someone else had a camera and they posted a picture to Flickr. Haboob over Phoenix Arizona. Check that description, "A massive dust storm called a haboob hit Phoenix, AZ in the evening of July 5, 2011. It was over a mile tall and 30-50 miles wide." Forget a mile tall, check out that width. It didn't hit Phoenix. It hit Mesa, and Tempe, and Scottsdale, and Phoenix, and Guadalupe... You know, how about we just say it hit the whole thing. If a city was vaguely in the vicinity of Phoenix, it got hit.

So why write all this?

Guess who was on the road when it hit. Oh. For extra credit, guess who doesn't have functioning windshield wash sprayers. Sure, the dust alone wasn't a big problem (if you don't mind visibility dropping at times to 10-20 feet). But when it first started to rain it was a bare sprinkling that didn't do anything more than make the dust stick.

So yeah. The TL;DR version. Monsoon season in Arizona is a joke, but oh lord are the haboobs real.