USA TODAY International Edition
It’s not like CSI: Finding cause takes diligence
SAN FRANCISCO – The increasing loss of life and property brought about by the Camp and Woolsey wildfires in California has been followed by questions regarding what ignited those catastrophes.
Investigators were trying to find the answers even before they were asked.
Cal Fire, the agency that responds to state wildfires, has people on call around the clock and they typically rush to the scene at the same time or right after firefighters, looking for early clues and trying to preserve evidence.
That’s just the initial step in a meticulous, painstaking process that ren-
ders a determination of the cause in more than 70 percent of the cases, a remarkable figure considering California agents usually encounter a charred landscape and perilous conditions.
Shane Cunningham, a Cal Fire staff chief who has been scrutinizing blazes since 2005, said he has narrowed the source of a fire down to something as small as a match head.
“It’s amazing what you can find,” he said. “You start with that general area of origin, work it with more intensity, looking at much smaller vector indicators, to get it down to your specific area of origin, then you stretch a grid line out and you get down on your hands and knees and you tediously go through each grid line you have out.
“And if you do that in that pattern, you can actually pick a match head that’s black and burnt out of a sea of other black and burnt stuff. I don’t think people believe it until the first time they do it.”
The cause of California’s two largest current fires is still being investigated.
Electricity provider PG&E has acknowledged reports of a power failure and damage to a transmission tower near the time and area where the Camp Fire was first spotted in northern California Nov. 8, though no direct link has been officially established. PG&E’s counterpart, Southern California Edison, also reported a power outage near the spot where the Woolsey Fire ignited northwest of Los Angeles on Nov. 8.
Whatever the actual sources of the blazes, chances are they will be discovered. Last year, Cal Fire found the cause of 73 percent of the wildfires in the state, including a determination that PG&E’s equipment was responsible for starting 16 of the 18 fires that broke out on Oct. 8 and 9 in the Wine Country and resulted in more than 40 deaths.
Data gathering needs to be done with the same attention to detail as in a crime scene, in part because the evidence could be used to prove charges of arson.
“It’s not like CSI on TV. Everybody looks at that and goes, ‘Oh, this is how everything’s done,’ ” said Tom Wieczorek, a former fire chief who is now a spokesman for the International City/ County Management Association.
“It’s really a lot of boots on the ground. You’re looking for signs, you’re looking for evidence. Were there flammable liquids used? Is there evidence of that? Because all those things do leave residual telltale signs. And you may have to bring in a trained dog that can sniff out that kind of thing.”