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August 27th 2009 California Fire Viewed from roof of home


August 30, 2009

Some video of the Angeles Forest Station Fire on Aug. 27th.Video is from various different points in the day, should have noted the time but I didn’t. Just footage of the fire from my roof.Disabled audio.. nothing special to hear. Didn’t bother putting music, that just seems pointless.

Anyways, Hope it doesn’t get worse! Hope you all stay safe, as well as lose nothing due to the fires.

Take care,
Peace

Firemen die in

California inferno

Video……

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger: “Please listen and follow the evacuation orders”

Two firefighters have died in California as they battled intense wildfires to the north of Los Angeles.

The fires, fuelled by record temperatures, are now threatening over 12,000 buildings, officials say.

Residents of 10,000 homes have been told to evacuate. State Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger described the blazes as “still totally out of control”.

About 2,000 firefighters are trying to contain the fires, which have burnt over 66 sq miles (170 sq km) of forest.

County Deputy Fire Chief Mike Bryant said the two firefighters died when their vehicle rolled off a hillside near Mount Gleason in the Angeles National Forest on Sunday.

‘Did not listen’

On Sunday, the wildfires rained ash on cars and homes as far away as central Los Angeles.

Flame retardant is dropped from a plane above forest near Los Angeles, 30 August, 2009

The fires were burning out of control in all directions, state officials said, but emergency crews were concentrating their efforts on the fast-moving northern edge of the inferno.

Firefighters were also trying to stop the flames from spreading up Mount Wilson, in the Angeles National Forest near the city of Pasadena, where many broadcast and communications antennas and a historic solar observatory are located.

On Sunday the fires were within two miles (3km) of the antennas, fire officials said.

Mr Schwarzenegger, who declared a state of emergency last week, urged people to obey evacuation orders, after three people were badly burned.

“There were people that did not listen and there were three people that got burned and got critically injured because they did not listen,” he said.

Two of those injured had been trying to shelter from the fires in a backyard hot tub.

Sheriff’s spokesman Steve Whitmore said the pair, in Big Tujunga Canyon, “completely underestimated the fire” and the hot tub provided “no protection whatsoever”.

‘Perfect storm’

Officials say the blaze is only 5% contained, with the area’s steep, rugged hills making efforts to fight it more difficult.

Map locator

Mandatory evacuation orders covering about 10,000 homes and 2,500 other buildings are in place.

Parts of Altadena, Glendale, Pasadena, La Crescenta are also affected.

Evacuation centres have been set up at local schools.

With forecasts of continuing hot weather, there has been speculation that it could take firefighters a week to bring the blaze under control, says the BBC’s David Willis in Los Angeles.

Wildfires are a feature of the Californian summer, but it is unusual for them to break so close to major population centres.

A number of other fires are also burning in southern and central California.

Fire menaces 10,000 homes 1:27

The growing “Station” wildfire consumes 20,000 acres, threatens 10,000 homes north of Los Angeles, California.•http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/08/31/california.wildfires/index.html

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/08/31/california.wildfires/index.html#cnnSTCVideo

AmazingPicsRT @LIFE: California In Flames: http://bit.ly/QfuPj

Wildfire Today News – Wildfire Today

Aug 30, 2009 … One of the best fire photos ever. Date Sunday, August 30, 2009 at 11:03PM …. DC-10 drops on the Station fire near Acton, California, August 30, 2009. …. Firefighters reported 80-foot flames as the 15-20 foot high brush burned. … Tujunga Canyon on Saturday where three civilians were flown out …
www.wildfiretoday.com/

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‘Reading Rainbow’ Reaches Its Final Chapter

‘Reading Rainbow’ Reaches Its Final

Chapter

by Ben Calhoun

'Reading Rainbow' host LeVar Burton with kids holding their favorite books.

GPN/Nebraska ETV Network; WNED BuffaloFor 26 years, Reading Rainbow host LeVar Burton (left) shepherded kids through the exciting world of books. The show, which fostered a love of reading, was the third longest-running program in PBS history, outlasted only by Sesame Street and Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.

Watch A Clip From ‘Reading Rainbow’

Video: LeVar Burton, host of 'Reading Rainbow'

text sizeAAA

August 28, 2009

Even if you can’t remember a specific Reading Rainbow episode, chances are, the theme song is still lodged somewhere in your head:

Butterfly in the sky, I can go twice as high,
Take a look, it’s in a book — Reading Rainbow …

Remember now?

Reading Rainbow comes to the end of its 26-year run on Friday; it has won more than two-dozen Emmys, and is the third longest-running children’s show in PBS history — outlasted only by Sesame Street and Mister Rogers.

The show, which started in 1983, was hosted by actor LeVar Burton. (If you don’t know Burton from Reading Rainbow, he’s also famous for his role as Kunta Kinte in Roots, or as the chrome-visored Geordi La Forge on Star Trek: The Next Generation.)

Each episode of Reading Rainbow had the same basic elements: There was a featured children’s book that inspired an adventure with Burton. Then, at the end of every show, kids gave their own book reviews, always prefaced by Burton’s trademark line: “But you don’t have to take my word for it …”

“The series resonates with so many people,” says John Grant, who is in charge of content at WNED Buffalo, Reading Rainbow’s home station.

LeVar Burton, host of 'Reading Rainbow'

Enlarge GPN/Nebraska ETV Network and WNED Buffalo.“I think reading is part of the birthright of the human being,” Burton said in a 2003 interview. “It’s just such an integral part of the human experience — that connection with the written word.”

LeVar Burton, host of 'Reading Rainbow'

GPN/Nebraska ETV Network and WNED Buffalo.“I think reading is part of the birthright of the human being,” Burton said in a 2003 interview. “It’s just such an integral part of the human experience — that connection with the written word.”

The show’s run is ending, Grant explains, because no one — not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show’s broadcast rights.

Grant says the funding crunch is partially to blame, but the decision to end Reading Rainbow can also be traced to a shift in the philosophy of educational television programming. The change started with the Department of Education under the Bush administration, he explains, which wanted to see a much heavier focus on the basic tools of reading — like phonics and spelling.

Grant says that PBS, CPB and the Department of Education put significant funding toward programming that would teach kids how to read — but that’s not what Reading Rainbow was trying to do.

“Reading Rainbow taught kids why to read,” Grant says. “You know, the love of reading — [the show] encouraged kids to pick up a book and to read.”

Linda Simensky, vice president for children’s programming at PBS, says that when Reading Rainbow was developed in the early 1980s, it was an era when the question was: “How do we get kids to read books?”

Since then, she explains, research has shown that teaching the mechanics of reading should be the network’s priority.

“We’ve been able to identify the earliest steps that we need to take,” Simensky says. “Now we know what we need to do first. Even just from five years ago, I think we all know so much more about how to use television to teach.”

Research has directed programming toward phonics and reading fundamentals as the front line of the literacy fight. Reading Rainbow occupied a more luxurious space — the show operated on the assumption that kids already had basic reading skills and instead focused on fostering a love of books.

Simensky calls Reading Rainbow’s 26-year run miraculous — and says that its end is bittersweet.

Reading Rainbow’s impending absence leaves many open questions about today’s literacy challenges, and what television’s role should be in addressing them.

“But” — as Burton would have told his young readers — “you don’t have to take my word for it.”

Related NPR Stories

TV Better Than Nothing At Teaching How To Read Aug. 28, 2009
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