Several UC Davis employees and a major research project were put at risk this week by the raging Southern California wildfires. They include campus firefighters sent to fire lines, Wildlife Health Center employees who live and work in the burning areas of San Diego County and the center's longterm study of pumas, bighorn sheep and deer.
Early Wednesday, Jim Bauer of the campus's Southern California Ecosystem Health Program, was trying to learn the fate of the study's radio-collared deer and mountain lions in the Cuyamaca Range. Field biologist Tamara Brennan had been forced to evacuate and had not yet learned the status of wolves she studies at the California Wolf Center.
Another Wildlife Health Center researcher, Brett Goforth, on Monday finished a year's work writing a fire-management plan for Cuyamaca Rancho State Park. On Tuesday, more than 80 percent of the park burned, rendering the plan obsolete.
"We're also very concerned about the safety of our many collaborators in the region, the parks rangers, biologists and pilots who are our personal friends," said Wildlife Health Center co-director Walter Boyce.
Meanwhile, UC Davis Fire Chief Mike Chandler was in charge of deploying firefighters and their vehicles from Yolo County to the fires, as the county's fire and rescue operational chief for California's Office of Emergency Services.
Five UC Davis firefighters have been in the Rancho Cucamonga area since Saturday trying to protect life and property for thousands of residents whose homes are still being threatened by the worst wildfires to hit Southern California in 40 years. A total of 11 fire engines and 35 firefighters from eight agencies in Yolo County are lending support.
Since Saturday, Wes Arvin, an assistant fire chief from UC Davis, has been helping to lead a strike team in a series of fires in the San Bernadino area. He told his chief by telephone that this is the worst situation he has ever seen, where homes literally explode from the heat of nearby fires. Homes, he says, burn completely to the ground in less than 30 minutes.
The strike team also includes UC Davis firefighters Charlie Grows, Terry Weisser, Cess Mercado and Kevin Cullison.