Surrounded by fire

Spring, summer, and fall are typically the dry seasons for Chile, but I've heard we are in an especially dry period right now. The drought plus a lot of hot, dry days have created the perfect storm for fires. This week I could see smoke in the hills all around my house. When we drove to church on Sunday we saw all the damage in the surrounding towns. Luckily very few buildings caught fire. Partially because they had clear, green lawns and partially because the fire had slow spreading flames instead of huge jumping flames.

 A huge fire burning in San Pedro, across the road from us.

 

 A smaller fire on the farm. They got it put out by the time the fire trucks came.

 

Remember how the power went out forever on Halloween? This is why:

 

This very smart buzzard flew into a power line and was fried.

It started a fire that burned up the whole back side of a hill. This was before it got REALLY dry so the fire eventually was put out and no major damage was done.

 

The farm has a generator so once that was running we had power again until the line was fixed.